THE COUNTRY HOME [chapter 



few. Without any reason at all where land is 

 abundant, the bricks are piled up three stories high; 

 and all around this structure we find only one small, 

 bayed window, and a narrow porch, utterly unin- 

 habitable — scarcely large enough for two or three 

 chairs. There is a pinchedness everywhere, in 

 striking contrast with the broad and generous na- 

 ture that surrounds it. Such a house, planted at a 

 conventional distance from the street, has a conven- 

 tional grass plot in front, where is to be heard the 

 eternal racket of a lawn mower, shoved back and 

 forth across the grass. This is not a country home 

 at all, nor has it any fitness outside of city limits. 

 If you go into the country, study first country needs, 

 country fitnesses, country possibilities, and then ad- 

 just yourself to the same. 



In the next place, it is to be of absolute importance 

 that you plant your country house where you can 

 secure good drainage. The sewerage must easily 

 flow away from the house. Anything like stagna- 

 tion should be avoided. If you have a swale or 

 slope behind the house I advise you to carry all 

 kitchen and closet sewerage to an open cesspool, 

 not less than four hundred feet from the house. 

 This cesspool can be easily made also a compost 



[38] 



