Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1889-11-06
OLD NEW ENGLAND.
Ruralities Ravaged and Ruined by the
Cityward Tide.

Donald G. Mitchell in Scribners Magazine.
The present aspects of the small farm
ing towns of interior New England are
not inviting; their wild, unkempt, over
wide highways show as much, or more,
of savagery than fifty years ago; their
outlying school houses are blighted and
dWaried by the overgrOwth OF bigger
schools beyond their borders. Only a
week since [ had occasion to visit such
a farming town of interior Connecticut;
the old stagecoach, which every other
day used to rumble along the highway
with it's load of mail and passengers,
was displaced now by a stumbling car
ry-all." that toiled over the hills to the
nearest railroad station; the turnpike
abandoned, and halt-overgrown with
vagabond grasses; its three little mills,
on as many different streams, which
ground the corn and turned chestnut
logs into sheathing and shingles-all
discarded and removed and the picker
ell pools above their bl oxen dams turned
into quagmires, overgrown with rustling
''cattails;" no bread made in all the
township except from stuffs brought
over l.tOO miles of lron-way. Or its
two churches one was abandoned and
given over to other uses; the outlying
woods covered more land than torty
y
years since; and upon most pasture
hills fresh forest growth seemed COM
ing in riotously, and stooled freely from
stumps on old notwithstanding good
holes Tor railroad ties but owing to
bad-conducted roads and costs of labor,
such timber land was worth less than
half century ago. | counted no less
than sixteen crumbling chimneys--
masses OF ruin over which wild bushes
bod civ
many inhabited, mouse-colored wood
houses with their laboring head-fold
and groups of children-fnding work
there and pay for it Gin pork and corn).
The larger and better houses were
rusty, but in iairish condition-yet in
only three instances out of twelve,
where inquiry was made, were these
occupied by sons or heirs of previous
holders. Roadsides and door yards
were more neglected than of old; lit
tie gain perhaps in the character of
the farm-stock; traces OF new blood
here and there in sheep and cattle; lm-
plements better; mowers, cultivators,
and hav-tedders working an economy
In labor; but no corresponding gain in
weight Of crops, or in nicely of tlllage;
none in fences, outbuildines, or adorn-
ments Here and there there was some
straggly outburst of new flower pos
sible toss over a front fence of the great
plumes of an Hydrangea Paniculata, or
in shaved circle Of grass weak group
of spotted Japanese lilies; grave-yards,
public and private, unkempt, brier-
grown, while some were fallen into
beastly keeping; upon the whole, such
sights as gave sense of Weariness-OT
Jade, odorless, unattractive region,
whose day of bloom and large truitage
had irreparably gone; one felt a convic
ton that the sons and daughters of the
Jew homesteads which still showed the
consecrating cares of good motherhood
and of a stalwart husDandship would
wonder away timeously.
There may seem reasonable cause for
such seeming decay in the fact that the
village was stranded far from railroad
purlieus; but it chances that I am able
TO set beside it a picture of another
interior Connecticut township OF equal
population and larger dignity, which,
twenty-five years ago, was traversed by
the GORDON OF an iron road; there was
more Willingness of outlook here;
smooth hllage; no unseemly powders;
easy reaches OF great billowy hills,
spotted with farm lands-showing rural
scenes which Saving picturesque lines
and counterlines of hedging) might
have been cut from midland county of
which spread out into quiet monotone
of meadow, on which the village lay
there brooded drowsy air, utterly un-
like the alert, busting habit of the
townsfolk who lived there before the
middle of the century. Tlllage indeed
had it's old reaches-nO more. no less;
the shoemaker and his shop gone-no
muffled hammering at the lap
stone; the clatter OF the chair-maker,
whose stout wares were hand-made-
silenced; 80, too, was the noise OF the
cooper, stepping and pounding round
and round his cask. Even the village
store-once one of three-and once be-
leaguered by hal!-score of teams come
in for trade or barter, was very quiet,
and the successor to the old merchant
(of whom in my boy-days l had bought
tamarinds for holiday treat) was seat
ed, in flannel shirt, chewing straw,
upon mis- doorstep. The fairest fields of
the town had been cut through by the
rail, /" and garden where | had gath
cred currants. fifty years beiore-(what
stately rows of them-What crimson
abundance Twas now part of the out
grounds of dreary "station," where
twice day the train of mixed freight
and passengers whistled and clattered
through. The County Judge" who
presided over the garden, WIS 80 long
dead that his stately presence had faded
into town tradition; and OF his eight
ouick-witted sons, all had drifted away
to make stamp of their incisive quail
ties in bigger and far-awav places.
The old town tavern, too large for
travel, had been made over to private
occupancy, it's stable precincts fenced
about and showing quayering lines of
potatoes; the new hostelry lao in fore
gone times been the homestead of
stalwart deacon, and its low-ceiled
room, which only echoes the uplifted
voice of ''GiaDt Chapman" n prayer
and praise, were now given over 10
secular uees | had the good fortune to
encounter there a young Californian,
Who had eome-in spell between the
hustlings OF business-to have a look at
the graves OF his ancestors buried in the
churchyard; be was a fine, bum ptious,
bouncing type o. Western ssertiyeness