The village, built on a primitive plan, consisted of one long, wide street, with a similar one running crosswise to it, so that the little town was divided into four almost equal sections. Where the four roads met appeared a large open space doing duty as the village green, in the centre of which stood an antique stone cross with elaborate carvings thereon, much worn by time, said to have been erected by one Geoffrey Garsworth on his return from the third crusade. As a proof of this, there could be seen amid the carvings, representations of palm branches and scallop shells, both symbolical of eastern vegetation and pilgrim wanderings; but Dr. Larcher, the vicar of Garsworth--an ardent archaeologist--maintained that the cross had been placed there by the Cistercian monks, who once occupied a monastery near the village. The worthy vicar, being of a somewhat polemical nature, was wont to wax warm on the subject, and held strong opinions as to the cross and the church, which opinions he was willing enough to impart to any curious stranger who might chance to have antiquarian leanings.
And a beautiful old church it was, of irregular architecture, with heavy stone pillars supporting both round and pointed arches of the Norman Romanesque style, remarkably fine stained glass windows, and a high, elaborately carved roof of dark oak. Standing at the end of the village, near the bridge, the graveyard in which it was placed sloped down to the river's edge, and at times the mighty shadow of the square tower fell across the stream.
A little further down was the vicarage, built of grey stone in the quaint Tudor fashion, enclosing a green square on three sides, while the fourth was open to the Gar. From its grounds could be seen the graceful span of the bridge, a somewhat modern structure, which led on to a wide common overgrown with golden gorse, and far away in the distance amid a thick forest of beech and elm and oak, arose the towers of Garsworth Grange, wherein lived the Lord of the Manor.
The village possessed only one inn, quaintly entitled "The House of Good Living," an ancient building as fantastic as its name. Standing somewhat back from the street it was built of grey stone, with heavy beams set into the walls in the old-fashioned style, and the upper storey projected over the lower one in a cumbersome manner, apparently threatening every moment to overbalance itself. There were wide, diamond-paned casements, with rows of flower-pots containing bright, scarlet geraniums standing on the broad ledges, and on the left a tall gable jutted out some distance from the main building, while in the corner, thus formed, was the huge porch, with its cumbersome benches for the convenience of village cronies. The space in front was of cobbled stones down to the street, and there stood the tall pole with the swinging sign, whereon was bravely painted a baron of beef and a tankard of beer as an earnest of the good cheer within. The roof was of thatch, grey and weatherworn, neatly trimmed round the windows and eaves, while above towered the great stacks of twisted, red-tinged chimneys. Altogether, a typical English inn of the stage coach period, severely respectable and intensely conservative.