56 NEW HAMPSHIRE AGRICULTURE. 



with pines and hemlocks. Here and there could be found old 

 growth white pines ( Pinus strobus) four or five feet in diameter 

 at the ground, whose ages reached back to the Indian occupa- 

 tion of the country ; the last survivors of a noble company from 

 which the second and third Georges had selected masts for the 

 English navy. It is doubtless true that not one such is now 

 standing within the limits of ancient Penny Cook, and very 

 few, indeed, in this state. 



Through the largest tract of the farm's forest the great cyclone 

 of 1816 had cut its way, prostrating everything before it. Its 

 course could be plainly traced by the decaying trunks, which 

 have ever since lain undisturbed where they had fallen, — pines, 

 oaks, chestnuts, maples, hemlocks, etc., gradually returning 

 to the soil the elements which they had formerly withdrawn 

 from it. 



The farm's water surface, of some twenty acres, constituted 

 the whole or parts of three ponds, severally known as Horse- 

 shoe, Back, and Little ponds. While this territory belonged 

 legally to the owner of the farm, its occupancy had always been 

 maintained by a class of men and boys, who delight in the cap- 

 ture of shiners, flatsides, perch, pouts, with now and then a 

 pickerel and a slippery eel. They were mostly persons of 

 leisure, whose time was not considered very precious either by 

 themselves or bv anyone else. 



The buildings on the Farm of the First Minister have always 

 been simple and unpretentious. 



The house occupied by the several proprietors is a plain, 

 gambrel-roof structure of wood. It has been changed but little 

 since its erection in 1734, and has sheltered six generations of 

 the family. 



In his history of the town of Concord, pp. 556-558, Dr. 

 Bouton gives the following historical sketch of it : 



"THE WALKER HOUSE. 



fc ' This house is [said to be] the oldest two-story dwelling house 

 between Haverhill, Mass., and Canada. 1 It was erected by the 

 Rev. Mr. Walker on [or near] the house lot drawn to the first 



1 Watson's Concord Directory, 1850, p. 6. 



