8 MY FARM. 



enters upon that ambiguous mode of life which is 

 neither city nor country, which knows of gardens only 

 in the night time, and takes all its sunshine from the 

 pavements, which flits between the two without tast- 

 ing the full zest of either of course, for this mode 

 of life, three hours is too great a distance. The man 

 who is content to live in grooves on which he is shot 

 back and forth year after year the merest shuttle 

 of a commuter, will naturally be anxious to make the 

 grooves short, and the commutation small. 



I bespoke in my advertisement no less than twenty 

 acres of woodland. The days of wood fires are not ut- 

 terly gone ; as long as I live, they never will be gone. 

 Coal indeed may have its uses in the furnace which 

 takes off the sharp edge of winter from the whole 

 interior of the house, and keeps up a night and day 

 struggle with Boreas for the mastery. Coal may be- 

 long in the kitchens of winter ; I do not say nay to 

 this : but I do say that a country home without 

 some one open chimney, around which in time of 

 winter twilight, when snows are beating against the 

 panes, the family may gather, and watch the fire 

 flashing and crackling and flaming and waving, 

 until the girls clap their hands, and the boys shout, 

 in a kind of exultant thankfulness, is not worthy the 

 name. 



And if such a fiery thanksgiving is to crackle out 



