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parents have neglected these requisites, in home architecture, the pupils 

 of the district will have, at least, one good model often before them, 

 which, I must say, they now seldom have, not even in our churches or 

 other public buildings. 



But I mustclose this lengthened essay. In writing, it has not been 

 my object to press my opinions with numerous examples, which I might 

 easily do, but merely draw attention to the subject of the beautiful in 

 Horticulture, in relation to education, and leave my readers to make their 

 own observations, and draw their inferences, from examples always 

 within reach. 



That they will find the influences of the beautiful in accordance with 

 my views, if they look for them, I cannot doubt ; and that they will find 

 a larger proportion of bad taste, narrow intellects, and evil propensities, 

 coming out of homes where the beautiful had no existence, I am posi- 

 tively certain, even where all else has been comparatively equal in 

 education. 



And how cheap are all these beautiful things of the garden and lawn ! 

 How passing cheap can we purchase happiness for the young, and give a 

 right direction to their forming tastes and faculties ! A log cabin may 

 have taste and comfort, and cheerful, happy faces within, and without, 

 a few native trees, an American creeper, or a wild vine, fittingly planted, 

 will produce more tasteful effect than an hundred times the cost, in such 

 decorations as the village carpenter is most apt to give the rich farmer's 

 dwelling, and the rich district's school-house. And if my farmer friends 

 will go a little further, and purchase five dollars' worth of hardy shrubs 

 and perennial flowering plants, and to keep up the midsummer display 

 add thereto the seeds of a few annual flowers, they may easily render 

 their rough, picket-fenced front-yards as fittingly beautiful and creditable 

 as the most expensive showgrounds; and with these living embellish- 

 ments, nineteen well-informed persons out of every twenty, will give the 

 preference in a decision of taste, to the log-house in its place, o^ er the 

 most ambitious mountain of brick and mortar, or the glaring barn-like 

 "big, white house" of your "fore-handed" country "squire," or your 

 rich cit, who comes into the country to rusticate, and builds his house 

 and plans his grounds after city models. 



And now, to conclude, I have but to repeat my advice, that you gather 

 around your dwellings the cheap beauties of nature — trees, shrubs, vines, 

 and flowering plants — and don't forget the delicious carpet of grass. 



