OUR COUNTRY VILLAGES. 



539 



a little shrubbery in the front yards, and it 

 is never too late or too early to project im- 

 provements of this kind. Every spring and 

 every autumn should witness a revival of 

 associated efforts on the part of select-men, 

 trustees of corporations, and persons of 

 means and influence, to adorn and embel- 

 lish the external condition of their towns. 

 Those least alive to the result as regards 

 beauty, may be roused as to the effects of 

 increased value given to property thus im- 

 proved, and villages thus rendered attrac- 

 tive and desirable as places of residence. 



But let us now go a step further than 

 this. In no country, perhaps, are there so 

 many new villages and towns laid out every 

 year as in the United States. Indeed, so 

 large is the number, that the builders and 

 projectors are fairly at_a loss for names, — 

 ancient and modern history having been 

 literally worn threadbare by the god-fathers, 

 until all association with great heroes and 

 mighty deeds is fairly beggared by this re- 

 christening going on in our new settlements 

 and future towns, as yet only populous to the 

 extent of six houses. And notwithstanding 

 the apparent vastness of our territory, the 

 growth of new towns and new states is so 

 wonderful — fifteen or twenty years giving 

 a population of hundreds of thousands, 

 where all was wilderness before — that the 

 plan and arrangement of new towns ought 

 to be a matter of national importance. And 

 yet, to judge by the manner in which we see 

 the thing done, there has not, in the whole 

 duration of the republic, been a single word 

 said, or a single plan formed, calculated to 

 embody past experience or to assist in any 

 way, the laying out of a village or town. 



We have been the more struck by this 

 fact in observing the efforts of some com- 

 panies who have lately, upon the Hudson, 

 within some twenty or more miles of New- 

 York, undertaken to lay out rural villages, 



with some pretension to taste and comfort; 

 and aim, at hast, at combining the advan- 

 tages of the country with easy railroad 

 access to them. 



Our readers most interested in such mat- 

 ters as this, (and, taking our principal cities 

 together, it is a pretty large class,) will be 

 interested to know what is the beau-ideal 

 of these companies, who undertake to buy 

 tracts of land, lay them out in the best 

 manner, and form the most complete and 

 attractive rural villages, in order to tempt 

 those tired of the way-worn life of side- walks, 

 into a neighborhood where, without losing 

 society, they can see the horizon, breathe 

 the fresh air, and walk upon clastic green- 

 sward. 



Well, the beau- ideal of these newly plan- 

 ned villages is not down to the zero of dirty 

 lanes and shadeless roadsides ; but it rises, 

 we are sorry to say, no higher than streets, 

 lined on each side with shade trees, and 

 bordered with rows of houses. For the 

 most part, those houses — cottages, we pre- 

 sume — are to be built on 50 feet lots; or 

 if any buyer is not satisfied with that amount 

 of elbow room, he may buy two lots, though 

 certain that his neighbor will still be within 

 20 feet of his fence. And this is the sum 

 total of the rural beauty, convenience and 

 comfort of the latest plan for a rural village 

 in the Union.* The buyer gets nothing 

 more than he has in town, save his little 

 patch of back and front yard, a little peep 

 down the street, looking one way at the 

 river, and the other way at the sky. So 

 far from gaining anything which all in- 

 habitants of a village should gain by the 

 combination, one of these new villagers ac- 

 tually loses; for if he were to go by him- 

 self he would buy land cheaper, and have 

 a fresh landscape of fields and hills around 



* We say plan ; but we do not mean lo include in tins smii 

 villages ;, ~ Northampton. Brookline, etc . beautiAil and tasteful 

 us llicy are But llieyare in MarSMohuMUt! 



