1S4 
CONSTRUCTION OP FARM COTTAGES. 
house appear in every direction, often accompanied 
by its appropriate garden, orchard, and green ; 
while, occasionally, he meets with the sweet rural 
village, the houses of which have sprung up by 
degrees, in detached groups, and arranged after no 
particular plan, with its rivulet and mill—its gar¬ 
dens and trees—its smiling pastures and green 
shady lanes, enlivened with poultry, cattle, and 
sheep, all of which awaken images of security and 
peace, cleanliness and health. 
Again, as he proceeds, the eye of the observer is 
forcibly impressed with the more recently-built vil¬ 
lage, or larger town, projected on a regular, though 
less pleasing plan, with its right-angled streets, 
long rows of cottages, numerous churches, school- 
houses, factories, &c., evident marks of the indus¬ 
try, thrift, and “ go-ahead-ativeness” of its people. 
And, as he reaches the more remote and thinly- 
inhabited interior, his attention is arrested, now r and 
then, by a neat log cabin, with its large and com¬ 
modious barn, erected on a handsomely-cultivated 
spot in the midst of a forest, or a prairie, showing 
that he is in a land lately reclaimed from nature, by 
the exertions of the immigrant, perhaps, from a for 
eign clime. To this bright picture, unfortunately, 
there are many, far too many, exceptions, particu¬ 
larly in a country where well-directed labor will, 
generally, more than contribute to the support of 
the artisan, when due economy and sobriety are 
observed. Without entering into a description of 
the habitations composing the squalid outskirts of 
almost every city, or populous town, or the wretch¬ 
ed hovels, which line our public works, or those 
which poorly subserve the wants of the squatter, or 
trapper, of the west, we have not far to go to wit¬ 
ness hundreds of dwellings constructed on no defi¬ 
nite principles, either as regards taste or comeliness 
—comfort or convenience; and it is much to be re¬ 
gretted, no matter who may have been the cause of 
thus corrupting public taste, that the mania should 
have prevailed in this country for some years past, 
for building Gothic castles, with “ pie-crust battle- 
Perspective View of a Farm Cottage.—Fig. 48. 
ir. exits’:’ and gloomily painted in imitation of dark- 
brown stone ; or for erecting fantastical and puerile 
“bird cages,” with gew-gaw carvings and other like 
follies, for the habitations of civilized beings. It 
is not unfrequent that we find these erections of 
fancy” completely embosomed in a thicket of trees, 
with their walls dampened and darkened full six 
months in the year; and even in the country, 
where land is cheap and abundant, we often meet 
with detached cottages, built in imitation of street 
houses in town, with the kitchen and living room 
in a basement, half under ground, throwing the 
fumes of the scullery, or wash room, into the parlor 
and other apartments above. Other things, equally 
absurb, might be pointed out, w ould the limited 
length of this paper permit, w T ith regard to position, 
ventilation, light, heat, color, incongruity of mate¬ 
rials, and internal arrangements, which are totally 
incompatible with republican principles, comfort, 
true taste, or common sense. 
The main causes of the afore-named inconsis¬ 
tencies, are, that most of the houses in this country 
have been planned by persons who never have 
studied the first principles of domestic architecture, 
such as builders, carpenters, masons, bricklayers, 
&c.; or they have been designed by professed 
architects, in the common acceptation of the term, 
who may have turned their attention almost exclu¬ 
sively to the construction of public buildings, villas, 
baronial mansions, street houses in town ; and have 
been reared in the rigid school of European prece¬ 
dent, if in any, imbued wdth prejudices at variance 
with the simplicity of our manners, our climate, 
reason, or sound taste. 
It is unnecessary to dwell further on the moral, 
physical, and mechanical defects in our rural 
architecture, as it must be obvious to every reflecting 
and well-balanced mind, that serious and growing 
evils do exist, which loudly call for reform, and it 
is ardently hoped that the suggestion will not have 
been made in vain. And now to the immediate ob¬ 
ject before us. 
