12 FARM ECHOES. 



appropriate term. The land and rocks had long dwelt 

 together in indolence, and were loth to part company, or 

 to work ; but the latter were forced into substantial walls, 

 surrounding and guarding the fields upon which they had 

 ;pent so many useless years. The lands, thus freed from 

 an incumbrance as ruinous as a mortgage, were promptly 

 at work honestly and successfully, for their new owner, 

 as if in acknowledgment of his claims upon them, and 

 t his detestation of indolence in any form. 



Each fall I returned to my Philadelphia home, greatly 

 benefited by my out-door occupation of the summer. So 

 charmed were we with our country home that each suc- 

 ceeding year found my family and myself arriving earlier 

 and leaving it later in the season. The sixty-six acres 

 grew, not by natural growth, but by subsequent pur- 

 chases, to nearly four hundred acres, which, with over two 

 hundred acres leased, with the right of purchase, gave 

 the present farm an area of about six hundred acres. 



My personal attention to the work I had laid out, was 

 absolutely necessary. I wanted certain things done in a 

 certain way, and it was equally " certain " that they would 

 not be so done unless under my strict personal super- 

 vision. 



This, it must be remembered, was when I first came to 

 Litchfield, years ago, and at a time when I was surrounded 

 by "hands" temporarily employed, all of whom were 

 strangers to me, and to my way of doing things. Among 

 them were some excellent, reliable men, who are now per- 

 manently or occasionally working for me. General 

 Woodruff, when called from his Litchfield farm by pub- 

 lic duties, would instruct his men what to do during his 



