96 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



structed the rude bridges and the highways, they planted the 

 fruit trees ; their houses were nurseries of pious sons and 

 daughters. In them there was plenty and there was peace. 

 One generation after another inhabited them, or came back to 

 them on holidays to renew their early associations, at the old 

 homestead. And why not continue the custom ? "Why should 

 you allow these old farm-houses to go out of the family name, — 

 to be demolished, to fall to pieces from decay ? Why is it that 

 these ancient temples of godly piety, and of all rustic virtues, 

 are falling to ruin ? 



There are crises in the life of almost every man who lives to 

 middle age, which are sad. As when a man parts with his 

 homestead. If he has laid out the grounds, builded the house, 

 planted the trees, trained the vines, — if his wife has watched 

 the growth of the flower beds, and with each returning spring 

 has given to the sunshine and the summer showers the plants 

 which she has guarded within doors from the cold of winter • 

 — there is something inexpressibly sad in this. 



But it is sadder far when a man parts with an old farm 

 which has been the homestead of his family through many suc- 

 cessive generations, and it passes out of the family name or 

 falls into ruins ! You have seen this — you have stood by the 

 front door of one of these old farm-houses when the last owner 

 was borne out by his neighbors to return no more. You have 

 looked eastward, southward, westward, northward, over acres 

 of tillage, orchard, woodland, which he had added to the acres 

 which had come to him from his paternal ancestors, and you 

 have then recalled with what anxious care he had guarded 

 these acres, with what watchful thrift he had added to them 

 and had extended his bounds, building walls and fences, ditch- 

 ing and draining, and enriching the old pastures, — increasing 

 his crops and his flocks and herds. Conservative in his frugal 

 industry, holding the world together while all about him there 

 might be changes, and you have been ready to exclaim as you 

 looked upon the old house, 



" Say, ancient edifice, thyself with years 

 Grown gray, how long upon the hill has stood 

 Thy weather-braving roof, and silent marked 

 The human leaf in constant bud and fall ; 

 The generations of deciduous man 

 How often hast thou seen them pass away ? " 



