TAKING REINS IN HAND. 95 



fertility and the order of the fields. I see, too, not 

 unfrequently, very showy palings in the neighbor- 

 hood of a country house, which are flanked by the 

 craziest of slatternly fences ; whereat it always occurs 

 to me, that the expenditure would be far better dis- 

 tributed in giving a general neatness and effectiveness 

 to all the enclosures, rather than lavished upon a little 

 spurt of white splendor about the house. A fertility 

 too gross for the buildings, so as to bubble over in 

 ricks and temporary appliances, is to me a far more 

 cheery sight agriculturally, than buildings so grand as 

 utterly to outmatch and overshadow all productive 

 capacity of the land. A kernel too big for the nut, 

 promises to my taste a better relish than a nut too big 

 for the kernel. 



These seem to me, at the worst, very plausible 

 reasons, if there had been no final, prudential ones, 

 for making the best of the old buildings at hand by 

 re-arrangement, new grouping, and by shutting up 

 such gaps between the disjointed parts, as should 

 reduce the whole to a quadrangular order, and offer 

 sunny courts for the cattle. 



If a sunny exposure, and grateful shelter from 

 harsh winds be good for the temper of the farm wife 

 and her household, they are even better for all the 

 domestic animals ; and it is an imperative condition 

 of the arrangement of all farm buildings in our cli- 



