H ouse and Garden 
than can the powers 
of evil cross the “hal¬ 
lowed vervain.” The 
long, white house has 
a railing running 
lengthwise on top, 
and an oblong, oval 
window in the center 
looks out like a calm 
and peaceful eye. 
The place is laid 
out with that exact 
symmetry which de¬ 
lighted the landscape 
gardeners of the time. 
At one corner of the 
ground is a huge long- 
limbed pine-tree; op¬ 
posite it, at the other 
corner, a towering, 
thick, dark cedar of 
Lebanon. The row 
of box that crests the 
second terrace is 
flanked by tall shrub¬ 
bery and long grass that thoroughly hide the 
inner space from the street. The straight 
path leads from the front gate to the 
front door; a straight hall runs directly 
through the house; and over a few stone 
flags in the rear another path takes up the 
same straight line and continues it past rows 
of old-fashioned flowers on either side, be¬ 
neath magnolia trees and syringa and lilac 
bushes,—to the gigantic box-tree which had 
seen the snows 
of fifty winters 
when our 
vaunted Uni¬ 
ted States first 
came into 
being. 
Beyond this 
seems at first an 
impenetrable 
tangle; but 
through the 
u n dergrow th 
there appears 
what was once 
a continuation 
of the path — 
still in the same 
straight line. The 
low, scraggly box still 
lines one edge, and 
pressing aside the 
thick branches one 
comes upon a quaint 
lattice-work summer¬ 
house, green with age 
and dampness. Deep 
upon it lies a mass of 
honeysuckle, and its 
sides are covered with 
a riotous gourd vine, 
which has matted all 
the clear space from 
the house to the dy¬ 
ing cherry-tree— 
with a jungle of 
leaves and tendrils, 
lying a foot deep 
upon the ground and 
tying the tree tops to 
the earth with leafy, 
swaying cables in a 
very abandon of 
natural grace and profusion. I his lavish 
beauty of nature in a wilful mood, uninflu¬ 
enced and uncurbed, is strikingly at variance 
with the beauty of that orderly, carefully 
arranged garden beyond the great box-tree, 
where rests the charm of earlier years when 
the flowers were loved and cared for even as 
today. 
A famous tree merchant once lived here, 
and his “ Linnaean Botanic Garden was the 
first nursery es¬ 
tablished in the 
town. This 
business pros¬ 
pered mightily; 
and when after 
forty years the 
Revolutionary 
War brought 
its fierce clam¬ 
ors and alarms 
into these 
peaceful tree 
and flower¬ 
decked reaches, 
tradition says 
he was forced 
to sell three 
THE LOT HOUSE 
FI at bush 
From the Front Gate 
THE WEST SIDE OF THE LOT HOLTSE 
2 ? 
