216 OUT-OF-TOWN PLACES. 



size he covets the number of rooms requisite of 

 the household service he will possibly require, and 

 of the probable range of his annual costs in maintain- 

 ing the same. But, with respect to the country, 

 whenever his aspirations turn in that direction, he is 

 in a maze. He counts it an indulgence, which, like 

 city indulgences, has no determined laws of cost ; it 

 is another opera-box, of which the trees make the 

 upholstery, and some Killarney manager presents the 

 bills in brogue. Under these conditions of uncer- 

 tainty, an intermediate agent, who can interpret in 

 some measure a man's own indefinite wishes, and by 

 a few direct, practical questions, reduce his intentions 

 to form, is eminently needed one, moreover, who, 

 by his own experience and observation, can suggest 

 the costs and capabilities of farm, garden, or country 

 seat, and enable the purchaser to take a complete 

 trade view of his proposed enterprise. 



To return to Mr. Urban his negotiations must 

 be largely through the established real-estate offices, 

 or by personal reply to the newspaper advertise- 

 ments. These leave him in a dreary muddle. Those 

 who have had experience, know why, and how. The 

 established agencies take no account of an applicant's 

 tastes, or positive wants, (if he were able intelligibly 

 to express them,) and are only anxious to make sale ; 

 the advertisements are naturally exaggerated to a 



