MY FARM OF EDGEWOOD 



no small percentage; and the inevitable in- 

 crease in value of all lands in the close neigh- 

 borhood of growing towns, may be counted 

 in the light of another percentage. 



All this is not certainly very Ophir-like, nor 

 yet very dreary. 



Again, it is to be remarked that the entries 

 for labor, and incidental expenses in the ac- 

 counts given, are for those expenses only, 

 which contributed directly either to the farm 

 culture, or conditions of culture — not all es- 

 sential perhaps, but all contributory. If, how- 

 ever, the Bucolic citizen have a taste to gratify 

 — in architectural dovecots, in hewn walls, in 

 removal of ledges, in graperies, in the planting 

 of long ranges of Osage-Orange (which the 

 winter mice consume), the poor little credit 

 balance of the farm account is quite lost in 

 the blaze of agricultural splendor. 



I do not at all deny the charm of such luxu- 

 ries. I only say — that they are luxuries; 

 and in the present state of the butter and 

 egg markets, must be paid for as such. And 

 the life that is lived amid such luxuries is not 

 so much a farm life, as it is a life — a long 

 way from town. 



Rus hoc vocari debet, an domus longef 

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