xii DOMESTIC SCENERY OF NEW ENGLAND. 



trees, — the gratuitous product of nature and chance. The 

 predominance of nut-bearing trees in these lanes was caused by 

 the squirrels that harbor in the loose stone-walls and hoard 

 their surplus of nuts ,by planting them under the shrubbery 

 in the borders. This path leads to a wood-lot, and is often 

 continued through the forest, making one of those green 

 avenues without which we could not realize half the attrac- 

 tions of a wood. Sometimes the farm-house is located a good 

 distance from the road, and is approached by a lane gliding 

 through a half-wooded meadow, and bordered with Lombardy 

 poplars. In the course of your journey you may discover a 

 house and farm enclosed on all sides by the forest, when 

 it seems a little paradise. But our country-houses generally 

 stand near the road, or distant from it only a few paces. 



The New England farmer is a hard-working man ; for his 

 land is neither very deep nor productive, and with the help 

 of his sons, or perhaps one hired man, he performs all the 

 labor upon it. He gains a small revenue by selling the prod- 

 ucts of the farm ; but if this were his only resource, his lot 

 would be hard. Adjoining the house, or not far from it, 

 usually a little nearer the road, is a small building with a 

 single door and three or four windows, used for a workshop. 

 When his harvest is gathered, he lays aside the ploughshare 

 and the reaping-hook, and takes up the lapstone for his win- 

 ter's occupation. The farm supplies his household with 

 domestic products, but his pecuniary gains come chiefly from 

 his labors as a shoemaker. 



All my life have I admired these little picturesque work- 

 shops, when traversing the old roads that lead from one 

 village to another. They are perfectly plain and simple in 

 their style, but as neat as they are unadorned, and beautiful 

 from their expression of the quiet and industrious habits of 

 the people who occupy them. There are no objects in village 

 scenery that so pleasantly harmonize with the cheerful scenes 

 of nature as the plain cottages on these roads and their little 

 adjacent shoemaker's shops. Nothing in the world could so 

 plainly express the union of comfort, freedom, and indepen- 



