His house was a ruin, and he lived in it the way a man lives in a coat he has had too long.
It had been a hall once, a real one, stone, with a roof — and the roof had gone at the west end and a tree had come up through the floor of it and the tree had died and stayed standing. There was a hearth big enough to roast an ox in and a fire in it the size of a dinner plate. There was a table. There was a chair.