CRITIQUE ON THE JUNE HORTICULTURIST. 



69 



alone ; or if not alone, he must surround him- 

 self with sycophants and parasites ; for he can 

 have no sympathy and companionship from the 

 truly worthy among his countrymen on such 

 pretense of mere wealth and ostentation alone. 

 They tell a story of Davy Crockett, who repre- 

 sented a mountain district of Tennessee in Con- 

 gress, during the Presidency of Gen. Jackson, 

 that wlien he had returned, after the first ses- 

 sion, to his constituents, at a log rolling, where 

 Davy was present, a large nundjer of his 

 friends liad assendjled, who wei-e curious to 

 know something of life in Washington. 

 Among other things, said Davy, " the com- 

 mon work-folks get their dinner ahout noon, 

 as we do ; the store-keepers eat about one or 

 two o'clock; Congressmen and office-holders 

 dine at three to four ; the cabinet and foreign 

 ministers dine at different hours — some at 

 five, six or seven o'clock, as may be." "All 

 very well," remarked his constituents, "but 

 we want to know when Old Hickory gets 

 his dinner." " Oh! that is altogether anoth- 

 er thing," said Davy ; " General Jackson 

 don't dine till next day !" The race of such 

 a man is short. " Out, brief candle," is his 

 history, so far as the " establishment" is con- 

 cerned, and there is an end of his consequence. 

 It therefore befits an American citizen to 

 build such a house as he can, if necessary, 

 dispose of without great sacrifice, or that shall 

 not distress his family after him to maintain 

 it. The old adage, that " fools build palaces 

 and wise men live in them," is as true now as 

 when first uttered, and no where has the pro- 

 verb been so repeatedly verified as in the 

 neighborhood of our large American towns. 

 The grand old homes of the English barons 

 and squires were what they purported to be. 

 There was " donjon keep and turret wall," as 

 well as " moated court, and bower, and hall," 

 a fitness of things to time, and place, and life, 

 in the ruder times we so daintily affect to im- 

 itate in the building, altogether out of place 



and keeping with any thing which we have in 

 the present day. The massive and imposing style 

 of country residences of the olden time, is now 

 absurdly mocked in our country in all sorts of 

 ways. The stately old castle of unhammered 

 stone, grey in weather-stained age, is counter- 

 feited in its entire complexion, in modern brick, 

 stucco, and paint ; with inside furniture and 

 trimmings to match. The substantial, hard- 

 burnt, russet bricks of the olden time, are here 

 imitated in wood, lath, and plaster ; which, 

 after three, four, or five years acquaintance 

 with the weather, becomes as ragged and bat- 

 tered with the frosts and rains upon its sides 

 as a sheep afilieted with the scab ; and so on 

 to the end of the chapter — a tawdry, untutor- 

 ed affectation of what one cannot reach, and 

 what, if he could, would only make him more 

 ridiculous. 



The plan of the house in your frontispiece, 

 is, in the main, a very good one, and may be 

 made entii-ely so by trifling alteration. The 

 entrance porch, however, is not a sufficiently 

 prominent feature in the design — that always 

 should stand out a chief feature in a country 

 house — as a mark of welcome, of hospitality. 

 It is, besides, too far from the centre of the 

 elevation ; it would appear better at the room 

 A, and in such arrangement better accommo- 

 date the interior passage from the dining hall 

 to the parlor — which, by the way, is not light- 

 ed at all — a great defect — unless it be from 

 above. A passage should also be made from 

 the inner passage or hall to the kitchen or 

 servants' room, that the front door bell or- 

 knocker may be answered without going 

 thi'ough the dining hall — a serious interrup- 

 tion when the family are at meals. There is 

 one grand feature in this hovise that I ad- 

 mire — the huge outer chimney towering up 

 the gable end from the dining hall. Wliat a 

 grand wide place for a blazing wood fire, at 

 thanksgiving, or christmas, or wedding time, 

 or any other social time, with a back-log and 



