MY FARM OF EDGEWOOD 



the lower flowering shrubs, and leave only a 

 tree or two for screen, it is an arrangement of 

 the leafy furniture, over which the successive 

 occupants have entire control. The noticeable 

 fact is, that the best face of the cottage, and 

 its most serviceable openings, whether of win- 

 dow or door, are given to the full flow of the 

 sun, and not to the roadside. What is the 

 road indeed, but a convenience? Why build 

 at it, or toward it, as if it were sovereign, or 

 as if we owed it a duty or a reverence? We 

 owe it none; indeed, under the ordering of 

 most highway surveyors, we owe it only con- 

 tempt. But the path of the sun, and of the 

 seasons, is of God's ordering ; and a south win- 

 dow will print on every winter's morning a 

 golden prayer upon the floor; and every sum- 

 mer's morning the birds and bees will repeat 

 it, among the flowers at the southern door. 



FARM BUILDINGS 



Having looked after the farm cottage, I come 

 now to speak of the equally homely subject of 

 barns and outhuildings. Of these, such as they 

 were, I found abundance upon the premises, 

 standing at all imaginable angles, and showing 

 that extraordinary confusion of arrangement 



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