November, Ig1I 
AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 
The garage which has an architectural distinction is one of the most interesting features of a country place of any sort, and should always occupy 
a place in the plans of the premises when it is found possible to arrange for its being included 
for the automobiles of chance visitors and guests, even though 
he has no garage proper as yet upon the premises. Of course, 
many families in the country keep their motor cars in old 
carriage stables. Indeed, the name “‘garage’’ so often sug- 
gests that of “chauffeur” that many persons have not be- 
come interested in owning motors from imagining they 
would have to hire chauffeurs to run them, despite the fact 
that an enormous number of automobiles are operated solely 
by their owners or members of their families. In this con- 
nection it is interesting to note the increasing popularity of 
the “visiting chauffeur” in country localities—a man under- 
taking the daily examination of automobiles for a number 
of families in a neighborhood, carefully “grooming” the 
cars and getting them ready for the day’s travel. As public 
garages and automobile repair shops are now everywhere 
to be found, any road mishap need not necessarily require 
one’s own chauffeur at hand when driving, and the “‘visiting 
chauffeur” plan has therefore been found to work out with 
great success, and it proves an economical way of adding to 
the pleasure of the country dweller’s owning his own car. 
It must not be thought that motoring is merely an idle 
pastime, at least not for the one driving the car. Indeed, it 
is one of the best forms of exercise for all-round develop- 
ment, calling, as it does, all the muscles of the upper part of 
the body, and many of the muscles of the lower limbs, con- 
stantly into play, and in such a manner that one becomes 
adept in their control. It has always been thought that 
driving an automobile was under no condition a woman’s 
profession; however, this is a great mistake. Hundreds of 
women throughout the country drive their own cars and find 
great pleasure in the pastime, as well as the profit of its 
exercise. It is, of course, more difficult for a woman to 
attempt anything like the repairs on a car, but where one 
leaves the garage with a machine in good condition, with 
careful driving one is reasonably safe from the interruptions 
and annoyances that might otherwise present themselves. 
As to the matter of safety, there should be no doubt that a 
carefully driven car is fully as safe as riding in a carriage 
after a horse. Unless one is content to plod along the road 
after what is called a “plug,” there must always be more or 
less danger in driving from a shying or unused horse. There 
is, of course, pleasure in horses that nothing else can sup- 
plant, and one does not pretend that an automobile presents 
attractions synonymous to those found in driving. Driving 
and motoring each have their particular fascinations, and 
each must be considered separately. However, the objec- 
tion to the motor car as being unsafe is hardly tenable. 
We have not, perhaps, paid enough attention to the edu- 
cational value of the automobile in the matter of bringing 
through its means to the attention of our children a better 
idea of historical localities. It is a pity that in the eastern 
countryside, almost every mile of which has some definite 
connection with our history, the children in the house are 
not taken on little home excursions to points of historical 
interest. This, perhaps, is because we so often overlook 
those things that are most near at home. Apropos of this 
it may not be out of place to mention here the plan whereby 
a man and his wife added actual profit to the pleasure of 
their summer’s motoring. They lived near one of the his- 
toric towns of the Hudson River Valley, a neighborhood 
much frequented by summer visitors, and by mapping out 
an excursion route to a number of places of interest in the 
