242 HOW TO LIVE IN THE COUNTRY 



to be a student of the landscape, not merely to hire 

 a landscape gardener. Nothing can be more dole- 

 ful than living in a house that was planned by some- 

 body else, unless it be walking around grounds that 

 you had no hand or thought in laying out; no wish 

 anywhere ; not a longing put in shape somebody 

 else's longings and whims for your occupation. Try- 

 ing will soon make you skilful and witty in the mak- 

 ing of gardens and lawns, if you put your hands and 

 brains together. And after a while you will get 

 in love with this sort of country living and doing. 



Forestry also comes within the circuit of the home 

 maker's work. Wind-breaks will be made more of as 

 the wilderness is swept away. Let Nature have a 

 free hand along your lines and plant defenses against 

 the storm. We may prefer her mixture of ever- 

 greens and wild cherries, or we may choose to plant 

 a wall of crab-apples fronted with bush honey- 

 suckles. Everywhere there is country art, for Na- 

 ture herself is preeminently an artist. 



You will fail of making a country home if you 

 fail to appreciate the art that is contained in all the 

 life about you. A robin's nest is simplicity and rus- 

 ticity itself, but whoever saw a nest full of those 

 blue eggs, so perfect in color and in form, without 

 a shout of joy and a thrill of gladness? In their 

 city studios they have no color masters like a bed 

 of roses. Jenny Lind could not quite equal the cat- 

 bird and the meadow lark. The bees in their hives 

 under the lindens build to beat the best architects. 



