August, 1906 



AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 



109 



largely used for cooking as well, but a guide cooking with 

 deft skill over an open fire, while the odor of the coming meal 

 wafts through the open to the waiting or returning campers, 

 is one of the charms of a hunter's life. 



But it is not alone in these log camps that Nature's offer- 

 ings are utilized. The Wyonegonic Camp in Maine, where 

 hosts of young girls have spent delightful summers fishing, 

 rowing, tramping, riding and botanizing, has the walls of 

 its club-house built about two fine old trees, taking Nature's 

 beauties into the home life, as well as going out to meet 



seats of artistic design built at each side of the fireplace, the 

 library table and chairs, and the books and pictures make a 

 complete whole, whose charm can not be surpassed in bunga- 

 low interiors. 



Ella Wheeler Wilcox's seashore bungalow, on the rocky 

 coast of Long Island Sound, is that of a worker. Everywhere 

 the books of her large and well-selected library are in evi- 

 dence. It is a place to lure a thinker and worker. Yet con- 

 spicuous as is the literary atmosphere within its walls, there 

 are touches everywhere of the sea and the shore. Fish- 



In the Heart of the Woods 



them. Seats are built around the ample tree trunks, and 

 ferns grow about their roots, while their rough sides higher 

 up afford knots from which hampers and tennis rackets hang 

 in close sympathy with each other. This same ideal camp has 

 stairs made from the small, round limbs of trees, winding 

 their way from the living-room to the floor above. These 

 stairs remind one of a corduroy road, and are as strong as 

 they are picturesque. 



In a camp in the Woodbridge Hills a beautiful fireplace 

 cut from the solid rock is a special attraction, while swung 

 above, by means of iron chains, is the half of the trunk of a 

 good-sized elm, which is used as a mantel. Nature and art 

 are combined in this camp — the wrought-iron lanterns, deep 



nets are used for portieres, decorated above with sea-shells 

 strung in ornamental designs. A great horse-shoe crab is also 

 prominent as a hall mark of this seashore home, while ham- 

 mocks and easy chairs invite the fortunate guest to stop 

 awhile, within sound and sight and smell of the sea. 



Mountains and woods, lakes, rivers and sea, each have a 

 charm of their own in the summer days. The lover of his 

 own campfires hovers near his own ingle-nook, and follows 

 his own well-beloved trails, but the lover of his country 

 travels between camps, searching out new beauties and fresh 

 joys. To both the summer offers itself with lavish hands, giv- 

 ing peace and happiness and quiet joy to those who spend its 

 sweet-scented days near to Nature's heart. 



<&£**> 



