HINDRANCES AND HELPS 



gular and unimportant enclosures, at the door, 

 into open lawn — in the removal of unnecessary 

 fences, and the establishment of groups of 

 shrubbery to hide roughness, or to furnish shel- 

 ter: all which involve little expenditure, and 

 are not in violation of any rules of well-con- 

 sidered company. I may now add to these the 

 effects of little unimportant architectural de- 

 vices, not requiring a practical builder, and 

 which while they lend a great charm to land- 

 scape, give an individuality to a man's home. 



The reader will perhaps allow me to par- 

 ticularize from my own experience. There 

 were, to begin with, some four or five disor- 

 derly buildings about the farm-house — sheds, 

 shops, coal-houses, smoke-houses — built up of 

 odds and ends of lumber — boards matching 

 oddly, some half painted, others too rough for 

 paint — altogether, scarcely bad enough for re- 

 moval, and yet most slatternly and dismal in 

 their general effect. They were not worth 

 new covering; painting was impossible; and 

 whitewashing would only have lighted up the 

 seams and inequalities more staringly. A half 

 a mile away was a little mill, where cedar posts 

 were squared by a circular saw, and the slabs 

 were packed away for fuel (and very poor fuel 

 they made). One day, as my eye lighted upon 



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