LITTLE GARDENS 



setting In of winter, though If we see the hfted 

 house In a low, flat country It doubtless means 

 that the soil Is so muddy or so subject to over- 

 flow that the residence has to be raised on a man- 

 ner of stilts, for dryness' sake. This perching of 

 a house on a knoll of such trifling elevation adds 

 nothing to Its dignity. It Is otherwise with the 

 early nineteenth-century mansions of New Eng- 

 land that stand on natural elevations either near 

 the road or at a few rods back from It. As a rule, 

 the farther from a road, say, to a distance of 

 five hundred feet, the more the aspect of Impor- 

 tance that a house takes on ; but there are many 

 fine old homes In eastern Massachusetts that re- 

 main on terraces, left by the lowering of the 

 highway grade before them. Usually the ter- 

 race front consists of masonry, and noble elms 

 and maples frame the entrance. There Is a sense 

 of leisure and refinement In these old manses. 

 A house that comes flatly to the roadside con- 

 fesses, in that fact, either that Its owner spends 

 much of his time running for trains, hence, he 

 can not spare a moment to cross a garden, or 

 that he is so devoid of self-resource as to occupy 

 himself at the windows, gaping at the pedes- 



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