LETTER VII.

From the Architect.

NATURE'S BRICKS ARE BETTER THAN OURS.


DEAR JOHN: Where to build your house may be, in truth, a question
quite as important as how to build it. I regret my inability to give
you the advice you need. Dr. Bowditch has, I think, intimated that
there is an elysian field not far from here of such rare sanitary
virtue that if its locality were known there would scarcely be
standing-room within its borders for those who would flock thither, or
something to that effect. I trust we shall some time have a scientific
practical investigation of the whole matter, and such definite
information as will enable us at least to qualify, by artificial
means, evils that cannot, in thickly settled regions, be wholly
avoided. Meantime stick to your text, keep high and dry. If you are
bound to have a sidehill, and can find none to suit, you can doubtless
make one of the earth thrown from the cellar wherever you locate.

Have you decided what materials to use, whether wood, brick, or stone?
You will hardly use any other. Glass houses are not popular, although
for their sunlight they ought to be; paper ones are not yet introduced
among us,--I'm expecting them every year; and iron, important and
useful as it is, and destined to become more so, is not adapted to
such buildings as yours. Wood, brick, or stone, then,--which of the