ROOF-TREE 255 



stretcher, and are towers of strength; the openings 

 pierce the walls and reveal their cohesion; every 

 stone is alive with purpose, and the whole affects 

 one as a real triumph over Nature, — so much form 

 and proportion wrested from her grasp. There is 

 power in stone, and in a less measure in brick; but 

 wood must be boldly handled not to look frail or 

 flat. Then unhewn stone has the negative beauty 

 which is so desirable. 



I say, therefore, build of stone by all means, if 

 you have a natural taste to gratify, and the rockier 

 your structure looks, the better. All things make 

 friends with a stone house, — the mosses and lichens, 

 and vines and birds. It is kindred to the earth 

 and the elements, and makes itself at home in any 

 situation. 



When I set out to look up a place in the coun- 

 try, I was chiefly intent on finding a few acres of 

 good fruit land near a large stone-heap. While I 

 was yet undecided about the land, the discovery of 

 the stone- heap at a convenient distance, vast piles 

 of square blocks of all sizes, wedged off the up- 

 right strata by the frost during uncounted ages, and 

 all mottled and colored by the weather, made me 

 hasten to close the bargain. The large country-seats 

 in the neighborhood were mainly of brick or pine; 

 only a few of the early settlers had availed them- 

 selves of this beautiful material that lay in such 

 abundance handy to every man's back door, and in 

 those cases the stones were nearly buried in white 

 mortar, as if they were something to be ashamed 



