Spirit of the age. [volume] (Woodstock, Vt.) 1845-1913, 1872-02-01
A Model Home.

Model Home, The picture is n pleusan
one and drawn with much life -
"I see," began Seville, assuming
slow, dreamy tone, 81 see beautiful
region of hill and valley-the hill
crowned with forests, the hillsides speck
ed with grazing focks, and the valley
in green and gold, with pure little stream
slipping murmorously along under firing
ing grasses and whispering willows
Peaceful cottages look out from thei
overshadowing trees here and there, anC
chief among them is one stately roof, tn,
roof of a spacious farmhouse, with
broad verundah encirciing it, and wide
doors flung open like hospitable hands
The boundary between this pleasant
home and the dusty highways is a greer
terrace, on which grow externally beauti
full pines. The wide carriage-way winds
in and out among the groves and shrub
berries, and lakelets of the grounds
which are not all in full dress, but arc
negiige here and there in chaotic thickets
and little wildernesses. Some wild, rol.
licking brook from the mountains comes
singing and laughing under the trees
and across green glades, sliding under a
bridge or two, leaping a rock, and then
bounding away to tell its little pranks to
the smiling meadows.
81 see barn-a great, generous barn
[ smell the new hay in its vast mows |
see little cosy holes where are fresh eggs
by the dozen. In the stables are two
magnificent horses, who rub their velvet
noses against my shoulder and look in
my face with the soft, fiery eyes of thor
ough-breds. Through the wide-hung
doors l see in distant field span of
stout Morgan beauties dra wing the load
ell harvest-wain, as if the work were 2
mere past time, their bright chestnut
c'ats shifting the sunlight like satin.
81 see a vineyard, southern slope
covered densely with iruity vines the
Delaware, with its rich fragrance, and
the drops of sunlight in its heart the
Hamburg, with its dark, massive clus-
ters; the Catawba, full of empurpled
honey
81 see orchards, with the scarlet of
cherries and the deeper blush of peaches
upon the boughs and, if it were a little
later in the season, | should see the rus
set-gold of pears, the vivid cleaning of
Spitzenbergs, and the pippins, yellow
and bright as stars dipped in sunset.
L see pastures-real, green pastures,
and still waters, and spreading shade
trees, and-such COWS Durhams, with
coats as red as rose, almost, coQuettish,
fawn-colored Devonshires, with the cream
almost visible in them Oh, my blessed
cows-with their great serene eyes, their
breath like clover, and their feet that
never kick If it were only milking
time l could tell you Of the Drumming
pals, and the low lows of content, as one
after another they are given a kindly
slap and dismissed from the milking
yard. However, it is not milking-time,
but the middle of the afternoon, and
under the trees, or knee-deep in the
brook, they stand, chewing and drows-
ing. Crossing to the hill yonder, where
one tree is flaming in premature scarlet
like a radical leader of fashion dying
to be weeks ahead of everybody come
into my sugar orchard, and see a pictur-
esque little hut, with a great chimney.
This is the sugar-house Inside are
bright columns of tin buckets, and hNge
pan for boiling the sap. 1t is not of
much interest now, but in March a nee
tar fit for the gods Is manufactured
here.
~ enter a woodland path, bordered
with sweet briar and woodland berries,
and ! saunter on through the cool green
shade. J. om enioyinga delightful walk,
the world of God comes so near the world
of man in the rich silence of this dark,
sweet forest
Il am in the garden-my kitchen
garden, place of sunny luxuriance,
where every vegetable thrives and -four
ishes as if it were a candidate for an
agricultural world's-fair. Mammoth .
squashes look upon the eye; melons,
half grown, lie among the vines like big .
sea-tlrtles cabbages there are, meet to .
thrill the heart Of Germany; soIdierly .
ranks Of marrowfats, and Laxton's Su- .
preme stand guard over beds of crisp
lettuce; and, although every known
is here found growing in an
size, there is still room
for stray patches Of piuks and Yiolets, or
mounds of sweet peas, that rise amid the
prose Of beets end carrots like fair little
poems.
GAS | move on, the vegetable world
ceases, and | come upon vast beds of
'trawberries--now, unhappily, gone by
and long rows of raspbeTies, white,
red and black. The vines are loaded
with their beautiful fruit. 1 can think
how, ut a touch from light fingers, they
would drop, and, having been touched
by those light fingers, how very nice
hey would he for tea
And now picturesque portions of my
castle begin to be manifest. | see the
lairy-hcusq, built ofstone, standing over
-he brook which runs swiftly beneath, as
i trying to bear it away on its light
waves the roof is shaded by a graceful
willow the air within is pure and cool,
md the butter made here tastes of dew.
lrOps and clover and all the sweets ofthe
meadows.
"Close by is the ice-house. Ice in
August is civilization
My path suddenly winds around
.rove of lilacs u world of flowers and
shrubs opens upon my eyes, and here I
IN before my house. | can't afford
wonderful house, but it is very pleasant
see high walls, cheerfully yet softly
tinted, with rare landscape or IL lovely
ace smiling down here and there fire
,laces, for winter evenings books, easy
'hairs, open doors-showing vistas of
lome-like rooms, and broad, sloping s
tdir-case leading mp to breezy, sunlit t
chambers.
" see one room particularly, room
ooking down upon parteTc of VERDE
las, and looking out to the hills, beyond {
which family shine the spires aud towers s
If a great city. The "arpot is like wood