The Home Acre

by Edward Payson Roe

Possibly at the time of purchase the acre may be covered with coarse grass, weeds, or undergrowth of some kind. In this case, after the initial plowing, the cultivation for a season of some such crop as corn or potatoes may be of great advantage in clearing the land, and the proceeds of the crop would partially meet expenses. If the aim is merely to subdue and clean the land as quickly as possible, nothing is better than buckwheat, sown thickly and plowed under just as it comes into blossom. It is the nature of this rampart-growing grain to kill out everything else and leave the soil light and mellow. If the ground is encumbered with many stones and rocks, the question of clearing it is more complicated. They can be used, and often sold to advantage, for building purposes. In some instances I have seen laboring-men clear the most unpromising plots of ground by burying all rocks and stones deeply beneath the surface—men, too, who had no other time for the task except the brief hours before and after their daily toil.

I shall give no distinct plan for laying out the ground. The taste of the owner, or more probably that of his wife, will now come into play. Their ideas also will be modified by many local circumstances—as, for instance, the undulations of the land, if there are any; proximity to neighbors, etc. If little besides shade and lawn is desired, this fact will have a controlling 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 day," is a good thing to remember. An orderly succession of labor will bring beauty and comfort in good time, especially if essential or foundation labors are first well performed. Few things will prove more satisfactory than dry, hard, smooth carriage-roads and walks. These, with their curves, can be carefully staked out, the surface-earth between the stakes to the depth of four or five inches carted to the rear of the place near the stable, or the place where the stable is to be. Of the value of this surface-soil we shall speak presently, and will merely remark in passing that it is amply worth the trouble of saving. Its removal leaves the beds of the driveway and walks depressed several inches below the surrounding surface. Fill these shallow excavations with little stones, the larger in the bottom, the smaller on top, and cover all with gravel. You now have roads and walks that will be dry and hard even in oozy March, and you can stroll about your place the moment the heaviest shower is over. The greater first cost will be more than made good by the fact that scarcely a weed can start or grow on pathways thus treated. All they will need is an occasional rounding up and smoothing with a rake.

While this labor is going on you can begin the planting of trees. To this task I would earnestly ask careful attention. Your house can be built in a summer; but it requires a good part of a century to build the best trees into anything like perfection.

The usual tendency is to plant much too closely. Observe well-developed trees, and see how wide a space they require. There is naturally an eager wish for shade as soon as possible, and a desire to banish from surroundings an aspect of bareness. These purposes can, it is true, often be accomplished by setting out more trees at first than could mature, and by taking out one and another from time to time when they begin to interfere with each other's growth. One symmetrical, noble tree, however, is certainly worth more than a dozen distorted, misshapen specimens. If given space, every kind of tree and shrub will develop its own individuality; and herein lies one of their greatest charms. If the oak typifies manhood, the drooping elm is equally suggestive of feminine grace, while the sugar-maple, prodigal of its rich juices, tasselled bloom, and winged seeds, reminds us of wholesome, cheerful natures. Even when dying, its foliage takes on the earliest and richest hues of autumn.

The trees about our door become in a sense our companions. They appeal to the eye, fancy, and feelings of different people differently. Therefore I shall leave the choice of arboreal associates to those who are to plant them—a choice best guided by observation of trees. Why should you not plant those you like the best, those which are the most congenial?

A few suggestions, however, may be useful. I would advise the reader not to be in too great haste to fill up his grounds. While there are trees to which his choice reverts almost instantly, there are probably many other beautiful varieties with which he is not acquainted. If he has kept space for the planting of something new every spring and fall, he has done much to preserve his zest in his rural surroundings, and to give a pleasing direction to his summer observation. He is ever on the alert to discover trees and shrubs that satisfy his taste.

During the preparation of this book I visited the grounds of Mr. A. S. Fuller, at Kidgewood, N. J., and for an hour or two I broke the tenth commandment in spite of myself. I was surrounded by trees from almost every portion of the northern temperate zone, from Oregon to Japan; and in Mr. Fuller I had a guide whose sympathy with his arboreal pets was only equalled by his knowledge of their characteristics. All who love trees should possess his book entitled "Practical Forestry." If it could only be put into the hands of law-makers, and they compelled to learn much of its contents by heart, they would cease to be more or less conscious traitors to their country in allowing the destruction of forests. They might avert the verdict of the future, and prevent posterity from denouncing the irreparable wrong which is now permitted with impunity. The Arnolds of to-day are those who have the power to save the trees, yet fail to do so.

Japan appears to be doing as much to adorn our lawns and gardens as our drawing-rooms; and from this and other foreign lands much that is beautiful or curious is coming annually to our shores. At the same time I was convinced of the wisdom of Mr. Fuller's appreciation of our native trees. In few instances should we have to go far from home to find nearly all that we wanted in beautiful variety—maples, dogwoods, scarlet and chestnut oaks, the liquid-amber, the whitewood or tulip-tree, white birch, and horn-beam, or the hop-tree; not to speak of the evergreens and shrubs indigenous to our forests. Perhaps it is not generally known that the persimmon, so well remembered by old campaigners in Virginia, will grow readily in this latitude. There are forests of this tree around Paterson, N. J., and it has been known to endure twenty-seven degrees below zero. It is a handsome tree at any season, and its fruit in November caused much straggling from our line of march in the South. Then there is our clean-boled, graceful beech, whose smooth white bark has received so many tender confidences. In the neighborhood of a village you will rarely find one of these trees whereon is not linked the names of lovers that have sat beneath the shade. Indeed I have found mementoes of trysts or rambles deep in the forest of which the faithful beech has kept the record until the lovers were old or dead. On an immense old beech in Tennessee there is an inscription which, while it suggests a hug, presents to the fancy an experience remote from a lover's embrace. It reads, "D. Boone cilled bar on tree."

There is one objection to the beech which also lies against the white oak—it does not drop its leaves within the space of a few autumn days. The bleached foliage is falling all winter long, thus giving the ground near an untidy aspect. With some, the question of absolute neatness is paramount; with others, leaves are clean dirt, and their rustle in the wind does not cease to be music even after they have fallen.