222 Allen's Rural Architecture. 



Mr. Allen's book will do much to improve the style of 

 rural residences ; it commends no tinsel display, neither does 

 it go back to the old meaningless mode of building ; but, 

 taking the medium path, he lays down the following truthful 

 advice : — 



The character of the farm should be carried out so as to express itself in 

 everything which it contains. All should bear a consistent relation with 

 each other. The fanner himself is a plain man. His family are plain peo- 

 ple, although none the less worthy, useful, or exalted on that account. His 

 structures of every kind should be plain, also, yet substantial, where sub- 

 stance is required. All these detract nothing from his respectability or his 

 influence in the neighborhood, the town, the county or the state. A farmer 

 has quite as much business in the field, or about his ordinary occupations, 

 with ragged garments, out at elbows, and a crownless hat, as he has to oc- 

 cupy a leaky, wind-broken, and dilapidated house. Neither is he any near- 

 er the mark with a ruffled shirt, a fancy dress, or gloved hands, Avhen fol- 

 lowing his plough behind a pair of fancy horses, than in living in a finical, 

 pretending house, such as we see stuck up in conspicuous places in many 

 parts of the country. All these are out of place in each extreme, and the 

 one is as absurd, so far as true propriety is concerned, as the other. A fit- 

 ness of things, or a correspondence of one thing Avith another, should 

 always be preserved upon tlie farm as elsewhere ; and there is not a single 

 reason why propriety and good keeping should not as well distinguish it. 

 Nor is there any good cause why the farmer himself should not be a man of 

 taste, in the arrangement and architecture of every building on his place, 

 as well as other men. It is only necessary that he devote a little time to 

 study, in order to give his mind a right direction in all that appertains to 

 this department. Or if he prefer to employ the ingenuity of others to do 

 his planning, — which by the way, is, in most cases, the more natural and 

 better course, — he certainly should possess sufficient judgment to see that 

 such plans be correct and will answer his purposes. 



The plans and directions submitted in this work are intended to be of the 

 most practical kind : plain, substantial, and applicable throughout to the 

 purposes intended, and such as are Avithin the reach — each in their kind — 

 of every farmer in our country. These plans are chiefly original ; that is, 

 they are not copied from any in the books, or from any structures with 

 which the writer is familiar ; yet they will doubtless, on examination, be 

 found in several cases to resemble buildings both in outward appearance, 

 and interior arrangement, with Avhich numerous readers may be acquainted. 

 The object, in addition to our own designs, has been to apply practical 

 hints gatliered from other structures in use, which Iiave seemed appropriate, 

 for a work of the limited extent here offered, and that may serve to improve 

 the taste of all such as, in building useful structures, desire to embellish 

 their farms and estates in an agreeable style of architecture, at once pleas- 

 ant to the eye and convenient in their arrangement. 



