144 
RURAL HOURS. 
for three or four cents ; raspberries, and whortleberries also, from 
three to five cents a quart. 
Wednesday, 2^ th. — Charming day ; thermometer 80. Toward 
sunset strolled in the lane. 
The fields which border this quiet bit of road are among the 
oldest in our neighborhood, belonging to one of the first farms 
cleared near the village ; they are in fine order, and to look at 
them, one might readily believe these lands had been under culti- 
vation for ages. But such is already very much the character of 
the whole valley ; a stranger moving along the highway looks in 
vain for any striking signs of a new country ; as he passes from 
farm to farm in unbroken succession, the aspect of the whole re- 
gion is smiling and fruitful. Probably there is no part of the 
earth, within the limits of a temperate climate, which has takea 
the aspect of an old country so soon as our native land ; very 
much is due, in this respect, to the advanced state of civilization 
in the present age, much to the active, intelligent character of the 
people, and something, also, to the natural features of the country 
itself. There are no barren tracts in our midst, no deserts which 
defy cultivation ; even our mountains are easily tilled — arable, many 
of them, to their very summits— while the most sterile among them 
are more or less clothed with vegetation in their natural state. 
Altogether, circumstances have been very much in our favor. 
While observing, this afternoon, the smooth fields about us, it 
was easy, within the few miles of country in sight at the moment, 
to pick out parcels of land in widely different conditions, and we 
amused ourselves by following upon the hill-sides the steps of the 
husbandman, from the first rude clearing, through every succes- 
