Page:Victoria, with a description of its principal cities, Melbourne and Geelong.djvu/79

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54
VICTORIA IN 1855.

Blenheim fronts in a bend of the river, with a pretty garden of about two acres in extent before it, fenced in. The house is on a gentle rise; the outer walls roughly built of uncut stone, partitioned with timber, cottage style, with a deep verandah in the centre, on which opened the dining and sitting room. A wing on either side, for the sleeping apartments, opens sideways on the verandah. A passage runs in rear of the two front rooms, dividing them from the kitchen and store-room. The wings on either side extend back for some sixty feet, forming a small yard, a wall, with gateway, completing the square. In these are the servants' apartments, laundry, dairy, and stores. Some twenty paces further to the rear is another block of buildings of a similar description, though still more rudely constructed. These contain the overseer's house in front, with stables. Wool-shed, and stores in the yard. On one side of the buildings is a large, well-fenced stockade, used for penning the cattle for branding, and the sheep for shearing. Close to this is the horse paddock, and on the other side some fifty acres of tillage are fenced in. This, and a similar field along the banks of the river, comprise the whole cultivation on a run containing 20,000 acres.

The house, as seen from the river, has a very pleasing appearance. The garden is always kept in beautiful order, and the trellis-work around the verandah covered with creepers, which extend over