54 AROUND AN OLD HOMESTEAD. 



The old-fashioned fireplace is roomy, and one does 

 not feel cramped, as he frequently does even in the 

 better city residences. Few things are more delightful 

 to the memory than late afternoons and evenings spent 

 with a book before the crackling hearth in the twilight. 

 'T is then we appreciate the value, in Cowper's lines, of 



" Homeborn happiness, 

 Fireside employments, intimate delights, 

 And all the comforts that the lowly roof 

 Of undisturbed retirement and the hours 

 Of long uninterrupted evening know." 



The fire is especially cheerful in cold weather, when 

 the snow is swirling and drifting outside, and silting a 

 little under the doorsill, or perhaps a flake or two fall- 

 ing down the great black chimney. Emerson speaks 

 of it in "The Snow-Storm :" 



" The sled and traveler stopped, the courier's feet 

 Delayed, all friends shut out, the housemates sit 

 Around the radiant fireplace, inclosed 

 In a tumultuous privacy of storm." 



And again, in his "May-Day," he says: 



Back to books and sheltered home. 

 And wood-fire flickering on the walls. 

 To hear, when, 'raid our talk and games. 

 Without the baffled north-wind calls." 



There is a painting by David Neal (I have seen 

 but the wood engravings of it) , in which the artist 

 has placed James Watt^beside an old-fashioned fire- 

 place, watching the steam come whistling from a kettle, 

 as it hangs over the logs from a crane. Many a book, 

 too, has been read in the firelight by tow-headed boy 

 lying before it. 



