TAKING REINS IN HAND. si 



and its pleasant juxtaposition of tints was so sugges- 

 tive of the particolored devices that I had seen on 

 the country houses of Lombardy, that the chimneys 

 have become cheap little monuments of loiterings in 

 Italy. 



The plank of the gables, wholly unplaned, has 

 been painted a neutral tint to harmonize with the 

 stone, and the battens are white, to accord with the 

 lines of mortar in the wall below ; the commingled 

 brick and stone of the house, are repeated in the 

 chimneys above ; the roof has now taken on a gray 

 tint ; the lichens are fast forming on the lower 

 stones ; a few vines, the Virginia creeper chiefest 

 (Ampelopsis Hederacea), are fastening into the crev- 

 ices, making wreaths about the windows all the 

 summer through, and in autumn hang flaming on the 

 wall. There is a May crimson, too, from the rose- 

 bushes that are trailed upon the porch. It is all 

 heavily shaded ; a long, low wall of gray, lighted with 

 red-bordered embrasures, taking mellowness from 

 every added year ; there are no blinds to repair ; 

 there is but little paint to renew ; it is warm in win- 

 ter ; it is cool in summer ; vines cling to it kindly ; 

 the lichens love it ; I would not replace its homeliness 

 with the jauntiest green-blinded house in the country. 



Of course so anomalous a structure called out the 

 witticisms of my country neighbors. "Was it a 



