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range of earthly view is, or ought to be, a 

 type of largeness of thought and soul — a 

 mean man from the country could hardly be, 

 if he had used his senses, —had elicited in- 

 struction from the teeming observation 

 around him. In the country there is more 

 time to reflect; more nature to attract at- 

 tention; more of mother Earth to give us 

 strength. What is it that ia said of the 

 mythic warrior in there ancient fables, when 

 overcome by his assailant, but to touch the 

 earth and miraculously gain strength;— so 

 of us, we want more of earth, more of the 

 hills, and trees, and fields, to make us 

 mighty. 



But for more substantial purposes, our 

 readers will think, do we like the county, — 

 for self-support, for matter of fact life, for 

 wherewithal to live. And be it so. We 

 need not reject in the humblest lot a par- 

 ticle of the sentiment we have expressed. 

 Increased cultivation of mind or heart pro- 

 portionately lightens labor, and is bounded 

 by no condition of human life. A dwelling 

 in the country, where we remove for pur- 

 poses of subsistence, or for any other pur- 

 pose, is too important an undertaking for the 

 whole heart not to be engaged in it. 

 Whether of log, or frame, or brick, or stone, 

 no man should build, be it ever so large or 

 small, cheap or dear a house, without some 

 symmetry, some proportion, some design. 

 Beauty and taste were given us by the Al- 

 mity,as much as were a limb; and he who 

 neglects their training, sins against himself, 

 and leaves behind him a lasting memorial of 

 his disgrace. 



Houses we have seen built up by the 

 thoughtless, that, in defective weather board- 

 ing, placing of the chimneys, or other minor 

 details, could not be made warm; when the 

 additional fuel they would consume in a few 

 months would have covered the expense of 

 a better dwelling, besides bringing with it 

 comfort and health. Again, a proper site 

 for the erection of a house is a mattor of im- 

 portance. In a former number we express 

 ed the opinion that when a nuisance existed, 

 a swamp, timber, ditch or hollow, we should 

 get on the south or west side of it. Those 



y 



directions being the ones from whence the 

 winds usually blow; and the same caution 

 should be observed in towns and cities to- 

 wards slaughter houses, burying grounds, 

 gasworks, and manufacturies, which give 

 out smoke and other impurities. For the 

 want of this forethought, ill health and its 

 unhappy concomitants, have followed and 

 been ascribed to the inscrutabilities of Prov- 

 idence, when we ourselves have been solely 

 to blame. Put your trees to the north and 

 northwest of your house, to protect it from 

 the cold of winter, and to the east where 

 they will shelter you from the storm, and 

 but few of them at the west and south to 

 cast a distant shade in the summer heat. 

 Trees and shrubbery too near the house or- 

 iginate unwholesome odors, which will not 

 rise during the night. We have enough 

 vegetable exuvium every where in the Prairie 

 State without soliciting it at the doors and 

 windows of one's house. 



We think a second story, if possible, 

 should be put to a bouse. Sleeping up stairs 

 we believe to be better than on the ground 

 floor; but in good situations, with a dry 

 flooring, and fairly elevated foundations, such 

 sleeping may be perfectly safe, and have 

 some advantage to the aged, to whom 

 clambering up stairs is a dangerous and tedi- 

 ous operaiion. Of water, we think that 

 which comes from the earth is generally as 

 wholesome as any other; rain water collects 

 many impurities, and perfect filtration is un- 

 attainable. We may, therefore, trust to 

 mother Earth, and drink our prairie water, 

 Irom prairie wells, with all its lime, rejoicing 

 in a slow death. At the same time rain 

 water should he preserved, and arrangements 

 made in every house, for its collection and 

 preservation in cisterns and other receptacles. 

 Water from streams is of the very first value 

 to the farmer, and if he desires it, he or the 

 community of which he is a part, must not 

 cut down the timber, or drain, the swamps, 

 for it is upon these that the springs depend. 

 The cutting down »f forests is drying up the 

 streams over this fair continent. In the 

 State of New York, the Mohawk pours forth 

 far less of a flood than it did within the 



