274 ROOF-TREE. 



the foundation walls are up and the first floor rudely 

 sketched by rough timbers, I see them walking pen- 

 sively from one imaginary room to another, or sitting 

 long and long, wrapped in sweet reverie, upon the 

 naked joist. It is a favorite pastime to go there of 

 a Sunday afternoon and linger fondly about : they 

 take their friends or their neighbors and climb the 

 skeleton stairs and look out of the vacant windows, 

 and pass in and out of the just sketched door-ways. 

 How long the house is a-finishing ! The heart moves 

 in long before the workmen move out. Will the mason 

 and the painter and the plumber never be through ? 



When a new house is going up in my vicimty I 

 find myself walking thitherward nearly every day to 

 see how the work progresses. What pleasure to see 

 the structure come into shape, and the architect's par* 

 per plans take form and substance in wood and stone ! 

 I like to see every piece fitted, every nail driven. I 

 stand about till I am in the way of the carpenters, or 

 masons. Another new roof to shelter somebody from 

 the storms, another four walls to keep the great cqsjT 

 mic out-of-doors at bay ! 



Though there is pleasure in building our house, or 

 in seeing our neighbor build, yet the old houses look 

 the best. Disguise it as one will, the new house is 

 more or less a wound upon nature, and time must 

 elapse for the wound to heal. Then unless one builds 

 with modesty and simplicity, and with a due regard 

 to the fitness of things, his house will always be a 

 wound, an object of offense upon the fair face of the 



