HOUSE AND GARDEN 
September, 
I9 I 4 
H5 
The fireplace in the living-room follows the 
lines of the gable 
Trellis and vines turned the desolation pictured on the opposite page into an enviable exterior. 
and there the walls are stained to picturesque agedness 
rious bulb plants 
that are hardy ; 
and along the path 
that leads from the 
far end of the ar¬ 
bor on around the 
little pond to the 
bridge, a border of 
happy mixture 
takes its way, re- 
straining the 
grasses at either 
side—which are 
not shorn to lawn 
perfection, but 
grow freely as in a 
meadow — from 
marching over and 
blotting out the 
path completely. 
A step down 
from the tiles leads on to the miniature dock, where a 
bench invites the loiterer. And if you loiter, the tamest 
goldfish that ever were seen will come nosing around to 
pay a visit. Beauties they are, too, large and gleaming 
bright in the shadows of the waters. On the doctor’s invi¬ 
tation they come and feed literally from the hand, nuzzling 
his fingers and stirring the water all about to lively motion. 
Sometimes a fish hawk robs the waters. “But there are 
enough,” says he, philosophically, unwilling to begrudge 
even a goldfish. 
A veritable spring-fed little lake is this pond, clean and 
sweet for bathing and not harboring mosquitoes because 
of the swarming fishes. Around its bank wild iris and 
reeds and cattails, and, indeed, every swamp denizen of 
the locality, are dwelling. On its quiet bosom lilies and 
lotus lie; exotics these, but there are other less lovely 
water plants that are also swamp natives. At the pond's 
farther end a bridge spans the narrowing waters, carrying 
the path on around upon the other side. This bridge was 
built of the timbers and lumber that made the elevators in 
front of the ice-house when it was an ice-house. Thus 
nothing was cast out or thrown aside. 
A rustic screen leads from the house towards the wood 
that lies beyond it and towards the rear, down the little 
Here 
slope. Back of it grow vegetables and small 
fruits — not in too hard and fast an order, but 
happily and with the nonchalance that character¬ 
izes all the place. The screen itself is truly 
decorative, being of sapling construction similar 
to the pergola, and supporting vines that riot at 
their pleasure over it. And it well fulfills its 
purpose of joining dwelling and wood and mak¬ 
ing the harmony complete. 
In spite of tinted whitewashings, the outer 
walls are stained and different where the earth 
rested against them for so many years; but this 
difference is not unpleasant, for it speaks of age. 
Out of doors is dining and living-room—and 
sleeping-room, if one chooses a hammock. Sel¬ 
dom is a meal eaten within, indeed, save in rainy 
weather. A table-wagonette of odds and ends — 
birch saplings and left-over boards, with a child’s 
cartwheels for its rollers—is in almost constant 
service, now in the pergola, again out in the gar¬ 
den, or even in the woods. Its 
lower shelf makes it a complete 
pantry; nothing about the place is 
as indispensable as this. 
The cost of all that has been done 
— grading, masonry, cutting out 
walls and putting in windows, and 
the frames and sash and glass of 
windows themselves, doors, parti¬ 
tions and all the interior work, the 
water system (which taps a main 
some 500 feet or more away), the 
sewage system with filter bed of 
most approved construction, the 
tilling of the pergola, the pergola 
itself, the trees and plants, the 
dock and two boats and the bridge 
(Continued on page 170) 
Stairs up to the loft have given opportunity 
for a decorative touch 
The pergola is truly Italian; built of sap¬ 
lings and paved with tiles 
Where grapes do not cling overhead, rambles 
the wistaria and akebia 
