92 MY FARM. 



household affections through all time. No sea so dis- 

 tant, but the memory of a cheery, sunlit home-room, 

 with its pictures on the wall, and its flame upon the 

 hearth, shall haunt the voyager's thought ; and the 

 flame upon the hearth, and the sunlit window, will 

 pave a white path over the intervening waters, where 

 tenderest fancies, like angels, shall come and go. No 

 soldier, wounded on these battle fields of ours, and 

 feeling the mists of death gathering round him, but 

 will call back with a gushing fondness such glimpse 

 of a cheery and cherished hearthstone, and feel hope 

 and heart lighted by the vision bringing to his last 

 hold on earth his most hallowed memories ; and so, 

 binding by the tenderest of links, the heartiest of the 

 Old life, to the bloody dawn of the New. 



There is a deeper philosophy in this than may at 

 first sight appear. Who shall tell us how many a 

 breakdown of a wayward son, is traceable to the 

 cheerless aspect of his own home, and fireside ? 



But just now I am no moralist only housebuild- 

 er. In the farm cottage, whose principal features I 

 have detailed, I have given fifty feet of frontage to 

 the south, and only the gable end, with its windows, 

 to the street. As I enter the white wicket by the 

 corner, under the elm tree which bowers it, the distri- 

 bution counts thus : a miniature parlor with its look- 

 out to the street, and a broad window to the south i 



