ppreciates even more
thoroughly, if not so keenly, the never-ending and ever-changing
interest by which he is surrounded. His admiration and enthusiasm,
however, are tempered by familiarity with some disadvantages of country
life,--just as the romantic house-builder finds on closer acquaintance
that, magnificent though a hill-top view may be, a hill-top residence is
not without its grave drawbacks, nor free from annoyances and practical
objections which too often throw a veil over the most majestic outlook.

A blue-sided, white-capped mountain, reflected in a broad, placid,
shimmering lake, and framed between fleeting clouds, graceful trees, and
verdant lawn, is beyond compare the strongest inducement and the best
reward one can offer to a visiting friend; but vile roads, distant
neighbors, discontented and transitory servants, and all the thousand
and one obstructions to the machinery of domestic life, soon blind the
eye of the unhappy householder to the beauty which lies ever before him,
until at last the one great good thing which commands his constant
thought is that romantic and pecunious friend who shall come some happy
day to purchase his estate.

There is another class, and a very large one, whose opinion concerning
the godlike character of the country it is our especial purpose to
consider here. The farmer and the farmer's family may or may not be
cultivated persons. Cultivation does not come by nature; and the
incessant and increasing duties of farm life leave one, however well
disposed, but little time and but scant strength for aesthetic study. The
farmhouse is the centre of the home life and of the homely thought and
feeling of its inmates. The farm on which one has been born and bred is
the centre and standpoint from which he regards the world without. All
those more tender emotions which are common to our nature, and which
attach themselves to the home, find their development on the farm as
well as in the town. Sentimentally considered, it matters little whether
the object of these emotions be on the farm, in the wilderness, in the
village, or in the city. Fortunately, man is by no means a creature of
emotion alone; and the satisfaction and good of living are less a matter
of feeling than of activity, industry, and intelligence. The place in
which one lives is more or less satisfactory in proportion as it
facilitates and encourages the better and more useful living.

Just as the citizen feels the attrac