It was a gaunt old house three stories high. The top story was unsafe because of rotting floor boards. There were two staircases front and back of the house. The main staircase was truly lovely with every spindle carved differently and people used to ome from miles around to see it. The banister rail was solid oak and polished to death through our backsides sliding down it.There were five bedrooms on the second floor off a wide landing with an alcove at each end containing two of the bedrooms - one of which Dot and I shared, Herbert had the other one. One Haloween night Herbert dressed a sweeping brush up to resemble a witch. White sheet, straw for hair, a turnip with a gaping mouth and a lighted candle inside. Needless to say it scared us to death as he intended. The house had been empty for seven years because someone committed suicide there and it was considered haunted. No amount of scrubbing would remove the bloodstain from one bedroom floor. One night Herbert was ill and slept in Dad's room. During the night there was an awful banging coming from the direction of the cellar. Herbert asked Dad to stop the noise, Dad replied it was not him but must be the horses from the stable. But it went on and on and Dad went onto the landing and froze on the spot. Such a dreadful atmosphere. He was unable to move. Now that used to happen every November. Came a day that Arthur came home on furlough and he and Ivy decided to take the screws out of the cellar door and investigate. Going down the stairs they removed a loose brick and found blood stained clothes. Further down there were two graves with withered leaves on them. Apparently Quakers used to live there and buried their dead near at hand. Later an old aunt of Dad's came to live with us and I had to sleep with her to keep her warm. One night she let out an awful yell, Mum came rushing in and Aunt said " He's coming for me, Emily" (presumablt a ghost) I just flew thinking he would get me too. Another night a couple of drunks tried to break in. On hearing the noise Eva came to me and told me to be quiet and that she was going to fetch Dad. She was gone a long time and I was petrefied. Then I heard Dad shout " The first to move is a dead man". He had been for his gun and was standing at the bedroom window. Another night Dot and I were singing hymns and Dad called for us to be quiet. Of course we continue till he came upstairs and spanked our bottoms. Much later Dot complained that her bottom was hot and I said it would be because she had been smacked. A little later she said " Oh but it is hot" and jumped out of bed revealing a smouldering mattress. The dottle had fallen out of Dad'd pipe causing the fire. He never smacked us again after that. We had a big cobbled courtyard that Herbert and I had to keep weeded. The outside toilet was a double seated affair (nobody else had one like it) and it was situated in a small copse. We used our bikes to go there. We had three miles to walk to school - there and back - a long way for a five year old. One day we forgot our lunch bag and ran back for it whereupon Dad broke a bacon and egg pie placing a piece of it in each hand. With no paper to wrap it in we ate it on the way to school consiquently we were as hungry as newts all day. Once a year a man would come with a stallion to service the mares and would sleep over night but one night, it must have been during November because he was scared out of his wits when a thud came from behind a chest of drawers. A cold wind hit him so he decided to go to bed to keep safe. Another night Eva was left at home to take the bread out of the oven, when she saw an apparition go upstairs with a lighted candle. She dropped the bread and ran to church for Mum. In front of the house was a plantation so we were awakened every morning by the rooks squawking. The servants quarters consisted of two bedrooms, a living room, kitchen and scullery. We had a very large living room, a best room and an old room were bikes and guns were kept. They also salted down pigs there too. The hall was large and airy, sometimes festooned with sausages and sides of bacon etc kept there because there was through draft. ( no fridges those days). In our living room was a large three dimensional coloured picture of the Virgin Mary with baby Jesus on her lap brought home from India by Arthur. On the sideboard was a beautiful amber cut glass water set decorated with ears of corn, we could look but not touch. There were many bible texts throughout the house. One I remember in particular was of Abraham sacrificing Isaac because the uplifted knife seemed aimed at me the night I was taken ill with scarlet fever. On Sunday afternoon all the village children would come to tease the billy goat. One day Herbert was being chased by the goat around the pond when he slipped and the goat fell on him. Herbert only just made it to the fence as the goat's horns crashed against it. Mother hated the house as it was dark and gloomy and of course the atmosphere did not help. Fortunately for Mother, Grandma only lived a couple of fields away so they could see each other every day if needs be. Mother died in the house in February and Grandma died in March just a month later. We continued to live there for about three years after Mum died, having a series of housekeepers till Ivy became old enough to take over. I remember, one Christmas, Grandma made Eva a big rag doll, black wool for hair and black buttons for eyes. It was quite big. Next thing we knew Herbert had poked its eyes out with a red hot poker. Another trick of his was to have a cotton reel in a treacle tin under our bed with the other end of the cotton in his and after we had been in bed for a while he would pull it and cause it to rattle and scare the death out of us. Remember in those days we had no television, no wireless and only a mouth organ and bows and arrows - so we had to find our own amusements. Christmas we hung our stockings up around the fireplace were apparently Santa would come. The same every year, one apple, one orange, a few nuts and a paper cap. There is more, much more but this will suffice for nowas I have got writers cramp. We can laugh about it now but it was no fun then.