The Birmingham age-herald., 1904-09-04
LETTERS OF COUNTRY LIFE
 TO A WOMAN IN TOWN
BY ANNIE KENDRIck WALKER.

:. trunks And this little girl understands
 the art of dressing well. She quite nu-
 initiated me today when l suggested a
 certain hat to be worn and informed me
 that this hat went only with the pink gown from Paris. There are coats gowns, 1 hats for everything. and if the l French maid-poor Manufactured make a mistake she would be promptly dis
 missed
 DO all little girls like to play dolls" ," I asked this adorable child.
 NO" she replied rather sadly There are some who hate dolls. They are like boys and don't know what to do with them, Ethel for instance" l judge from the air that accompanied this remarke that Ethel will grow up to be very uninteresting woman, with cut any tendency to domesticity If she has any children she will neglect them shamefully. She Is already missing a great deal, since she disdains the play like stage and knows nothing of its unspeakable joys Do you not recall when Jean Val Jean bought the large wax doll for little Cosette and she held It so silently to her little heart that he said .'Play Cosette."
 70, I am playing" she rerlied. Among the women who have their sum mer homes here is a very delightful wo- man who Is well known in southern so- ciety She has a smart town house where she entertains charmingly all winter and then her idea of happiness is 10 shut 1t up for six months and live In the eoun- try. J think there Is an art about coun- try life and I have never seen any one who understands 1t as does this woman. She believes that you should live quite as luXuriously and comfortably in the country as you do in town In the coun- try she has a greater number of horses as there Is more time for riding and driv- ing, and everything about her house, about her daily life Is as charming as if she lived here the entire year. Still she doGS not make the mistake that many women do in the furnishing of their country houses, and she studies color effects until everything blends perfectly with the landscape. In one of the guest chambers there is a large alcove the windows of which look out upon a limit less view of meadow and sky and noun tain.
 She has the low window seat done in a soft green and the curtains are tie same shade. You cannot imagine rny- thing more restful. the whole effect be- ing as If the landscape was :. part of your room. You really fec, as if a gor- geous tapestry was being held up before your vision.
 I need hardly tell you this woman's life is a daily inspirstion. because woman who does thipss like this has what some one has calied the far view of life And this means that her unselfishness is as refreshing as the mists covering the clo- yer.
 The country house which I wrote you is so decidedly English looking, is full of delightful surprises only you must wait till a rainy day to discover them. Otherwise you would lose some of the sunshine glinting the meadows--you would miss the delicious freshness of this out door life
 I am in love with the little entrance because of its quaint. curiousy carved knocker in heavy wrought Iron. and the stone steps leading to the doors. These are, too, broad, picturesque locking, and the white succeed entrance has a lattic- ed facade, which is now a bower of non eysucl1le and clematis. There are wide spaces, below where are placed long box es of ferns, and the English people who formerly owned the place knew the charm of green terraces
 What 1 like best are the charming windows. A house can be so easily made uncomfortable by having its windows built in the wrong end. All of these open either on the mountain sunsets, or the sweeping meadows, or the driveways by the French Broad river. and they open out like exquisitely latticed doors
 The window panes are very small and when you see them framed in English ivy the effect is very beautiful This ivy covers the tall chimneys and clinging to the sloping roofs gives an exquisite softness to everything just as the sunset has touched the apple trees in the old or- chard into a delicious pink and made even the cornfields the shade of a pas tel
 There Is woman here who came as a bride a year ago. Her husband is a young minister. I met her quite by ac- cldent on one of the tennis courts, but was al once Interested in young wo- man who had come from city to the heart of the mountains and who Is en- tirely isolated from society. The only opportunity she has for seeing any of her friends Is when she is invited to play tennis at some court miles away, because her own house Is extremely re- mote. Her husband has several churches in the mountain settlements, and the only people that she sees day after day are the natives.
 If the government had arranged an exhibit of it's mountaineers at the Louis jana Purchase exposition. it would have offset the Filipinos. This will give you some idea of what a womna attempts when she tries 10 improve the environ ment of the native mountain women of her own land. They speak a strange loibue'' AuelI tuSlOiHS aIc ulleItHt anu they make 1t very difficult to approach them even in a neighborly spirit This is a certain class of mountain people There is another class, other women of the hills who are interesting in many ways, and from whom you can learn many things.
 This young minister's wife said that the mountain women whom she first called on were as afraid of her as death. but that gradually she had lessened the gulf
 I asked her what she talked to them about how she managed a conversa- ton.
 "Oh," she said q talked about their children. Then when this subject was exhausted I learned how many chickens they had and when to set hens. l know