Litchfield enquirer., 1880-09-23
q. e.r4 = ssae,gag yarvg - .rosi. Il 1ojeh
WHOLE NO. 1886

GLOW much, then, for lodging and. break
In hesitating, somewhat embarrassed way,
she replied t...l IA 90 -.... ..l.. - O. 'eaI
"We seldom entertain strangers. Would
would fifty cents be too much2" ti't
.'Not at all" answered, paying her with
regret, for hers was Just the country house
had longed to get into. Still, am anything
but sorry that / had to come oIthe village,
which is practically the country too. Indeed
I would not have missed coming here for any
consideration, SO great is the historic interest
attaching to it, to say nothing of the peculiar
charm of its scenery. ip'
As you draw near the village an ancient
and sadly Zone might say shamefully) negt
lected graveyard recalls the pictures you have
seen hundred times of English graveyards.
Further on, weather. beaten house, made,
wholly of shingles, promises town OF hoary
antiquity. But this promise is soon broken.
The handsome church, with its tall steepie,
lis just receivinga new suit OF paint, the two
stores look news so do most of the dwellings
near them; and yonder-there can be no mis-
take-the four houses, side by side, without q
fence even of wire between their lava, are
Enthusiastically new, Yes, but previous to the
building of the first of these houses no new
dwelling had been erected here for five and
twenty years. Seine of the houses that look
fresh are in reality hundred and fifty years
old, White paint and a few alterations on
the outside have give them modern look,
but the implanted, sway back barns behind
them tell tale of the olden time.
Curiosity prompts me to ask the cost of the
houses built within the last few years.
''Mine, " says my host, ''including the stable,
weodhouse, &C., cost me So, 300: but it was
built when labor and lumber were cheap, and
Just before the boom in nails, etc., began"
His house. in common with the great major
ity of modern New England houses, presents
a gable front, with wings aud side porches,
and only wish were architect enough to
tell how, by sacrificing the wide halls to-
which we of the South are used, an incredible
number of rooms, with closets and conyen-
fences OF many kinds, arc gained. Eleven
rooms, most of them of good size, besides
garrett and cellar, are in this house. The
kitchen, with its pantry and cozy little bou-
doir for the mistress to sit and sew in while
she watches her cooking, is marvel of COM
fort. ~ 10y
Lebanon is on an elongated hill watered on
its northern and southern sides by brooks one
of which is large enough to drive mill. At
ter you get away from the houses, clustered
somewhat thlckly in the center of the village,
you realize fully what farming town" is.
For mile or more on the streets Or roads
the compass, but particularly toward the east
and the west, farm houses appear at intervals
of from one hundred to two hundred yards,
and on both sides of the road. The walk
eastward is specially attractive, for here the
street becomes broad widening lane, clothed
with sod and EMPOWERED with trees, many of
them old and stately. l have seen nothing
more thoroughly rural in its beauty. If in
place of the stone walls there were hawthorn
hedges, and the farm houses were only thatch-
ed and diamond PANIED, it would be old Eng
land over again., And this summer New Eng
land is at its best. 1t has rained for two or
three days out of every week of my sojourn,
interfering not a little with my business of
seeing the country and the people, but giving
to the landscape all the charm that verdure
and plenteous fields can impart. For milk
and butter Lebanon is one of the best town
ships in the State moreover this Is an excel
lent fruit year. The orchards, old and new,
are sight to see. Nature, on a big pomo-
logical drunk, has turned all her pockets
wrong side out, and there are apples upon APP
piles. enough to give boy brain fever and
subsequently the stomach ache. SEA ..-..s..
Lebanon was settled in the latter part of the
seventeenth century 1t is famous for beiag
the residence of Gov. Jonathan Trumbull
whose long and we'll spent life in the service
of his country" said Washington, entitled
him to rank ''among the first PATRIOTS" He
was, in no small degree, the Carnot of his
day, the organizer of victory, war governor
in the best sense of the term. His hotlse, still
standing and but little changed inside, lodged
at various times Washington, jefferson, and
the two Adamses, Jay, Benz. Franklin, Knox,
Putnam, Count Rochambeau, Admiral Tier
nay, the Duke de Lauzun, and the Marquis
de Chastellux. His son, the famous painter
of VINO
house. His store, which was also bis war Of
fee, is here intact, Just as it was when he Oc-l
cupied it, but moved a hundred yards or 80
from where it originally stood. 1t is a little
hip-root affair, dingy without and within. A
colored washerwomau lives in it, Imagine
my establishment when she told me her name
was Louise Garland, from Richmond, Va,
and that her husband, Cicero, had belonged to
Sterling Claiborne, Esq, formerly a distin-
guished lawyer of Amherst county, Va. In
the partition of the estate he became the prop
erty of Mr.. Claiborne's granddaughter, Mrs.
DR.. r. T. Coleman, of Richmond. .......
'Why, Louisa, / exclaimed" 81 feel as if
we were kihfolks." A fat, jolly soul, unlike
the negroes born at the North, she laughed
heartily at this. ..............t ~.y. q.
'And how do you like Yankee land,
Louisa?" a....'H "
'Mighty we'll, but for one thing" II il 1855
"What is that p
"Well, it's 80 lonesome here"
Chow lonesome?" ..t 70 aaI ~ .'''' .'
''Oh !! there is so few colored people, and
there amt no colored church. | belongs to
that church," (pointing to the Congregational
church, ''but that amt like my own church,
on Shockoe Hill. ".,.-s a1t' VI e.'<H,
In this Congregational Church l heard on c,
Sunday last an excellent, thoroughly orthodox
sermon A single political allusion was made.
The minister prayed that the choice OF the
people in the approaching election might fall
on 'lnen who would be Gods choice" When
the choir stood up in the elevated pen allot1
ted them in then upper right-hand corner OF
the church, they looked like 30 many musical
prisoners in the dock. The effect was very +.
odd. ''''''' .,tr.-s- .sg...,,-
Just as am about to close, an item Of decid-
ed interest comes to me. The young lady who
sings so blithely over her flowers does not as
sist in the wash-tub department. Her father
has exclusive charge of it. Once a week."
listen, We Southern husbands-he takes the
soiled linen of the family out to the farm and
washes it with his own fair hands. This is no
jest, but the literal truth have It on COED
~ ga ae H,aal b. b: '7'-
i +. THE NT.rARETIE INN -,