influence; if, on the other hand, the proprietor wishes to make
his acre as productive as possible, the house will be built nearer
the street, wider open space will be left for the garden, and
fruit-trees will predominate over those grown merely for shade and
beauty. There are few who would care to follow a plan which many
others had adopted. Indeed, it would be the natural wish of
persons of taste to impart something of their own individuality to
their rural home; and the effort to do this would afford much
agreeable occupation. Plates giving the elevation and arrangement
of country homes can be studied by the evening lamp; visits to
places noted for their beauty, simplicity, and good taste will
afford motives for many a breezy drive; while useful suggestions
from what had been accomplished by others may repay for an
extended journey. Such observations and study will cost little
more than an agreeable expenditure of time; and surely a home is
worth careful thought. It then truly becomes YOUR home--something
that you have evolved with loving effort. Dear thoughts of wife
and children enter into its very materiality; walks are planned
with a loving consciousness of the feet which are to tread them,
and trees planted with prophetic vision of the groups that will
gather beneath the shade. This could scarcely be true if the acre
were turned over to architect, builders, and landscape-gardeners,
with an agreement that you should have possession at a specified
time.

We will suppose that it is early spring, that the ground has
received its second plowing, and that the carriage-drive and the
main walks have been marked out on paper, or, better still, on a
carefully considered map. There is now so much to do that one is
almost bewildered; and the old saying, "Rome was not built in a