162 THE FAT OF THE LAND 
and a goodly number of friends. We had agreed 
that the house should be simple in all ways, with 
no hard wood except floors, and no ornamenta- 
tion except paint and paper. It must be larger 
than our needs, for we looked forward to delight- 
ful visits from many friends. We were to have 
more leisure than ever before for social life, and 
we desired to make the most of our opportunities. 
A country house is by all odds the finest place 
to entertain friends and to be entertained by 
them. They come on invitation, not as a matter 
of form, and they stay long enough to put by 
questions of weather, clothes, and servant-girls, 
and to get right down to good old-fashioned 
visiting. Real heart-to-heart talks are everyday 
occurrences in country visits, while. they are 
exceptional in city calls) We meant to make 
much of our friends at Four Oaks, and to have 
them make much of us. We have discovered new 
values even in old friends, since we began to live 
with them, weeks at a time, under the same 
roof. Their interests are ours, and our plans are 
warmly taken up by them. There is nothing 
like it among the turmoils and interruptions of 
town life, and the older we grow the more we 
need this sort of rest among our friends. The 
guest book at the farm will show very few weeks, 
in the past six years, when friends haven’t been 
with us, and Polly and I feel that the pleasure 
we have received from this source ought to be 
placed on the credit side of the farm ledger. 
