Village Improvements And Farm Villages Part 4

Porous substances condense gases--air, oxygen, etc.--in proportion to the extent of their interior surface. The well-known disinfecting action of charcoal--the surface of the interior particles of which equal from fifty to one hundred square feet to each cubic inch of material, and all of which surface is active in condensing oxygen--is due not simply to an absorption of foul-smelling odors, but to an actual destruction of them by slow combustion, so that the same ma.s.s of charcoal, if kept dry and porous, will continue almost indefinitely its undiminished disinfecting action.

The earth used in the closet is a porous material, sufficiently dry for the free admission of air or of oxygen. The foulest materials when covered with dry earth at once lose their odor, and are in time as effectively destroyed by combustion (oxidized) as though they had been burned in a furnace. The process is more slow, but none the less sure; and it is clear that in the case of my dirt-heap the foul matters added have thus been destroyed. The practical bearings of this fact are of the utmost importance. Earth is not to be regarded as a vehicle for the inoffensive removal beyond the limits of the town of what has. .h.i.therto been its most troublesome product, but as a medium for bringing together the offensive ingredients of this product, and the world's great scavenger, oxygen. My experiment seems to demonstrate the fact that there is no occasion to carry away the product from the place where it has been produced, as after a reasonable time it has ceased to exist, and there remains only a ma.s.s of earth which is in all respects as effective as any fresh supply that could be subst.i.tuted.

The quant.i.ty necessary to be provided can be determined only by extended trial. My experiment proves that the amount needed does not exceed one thousand pounds for each member of the household, and that this amount once provided will remain permanently effective to accomplish its purpose.

With a suitable public supply of water for the purpose, and with a suitable means of disposal, nothing can be better and nothing is more easily kept in good condition than well-regulated and properly ventilated water-closets. Where these are available, with enough water for their flus.h.i.+ng, their use is to be recommended. Where there is not sufficient water, there a well-regulated system of earth-closets seems to be imperatively demanded. By one process or the other we must prevent the fouling of the lower soil, and the consequent tainting of wells and springs, and the ground under houses and adjoining their cellars. With a system of sub-irrigation pipes which deliver foul matters into earth that is subject to the active operation of oxidizing influences, we need fear no contamination of the deep and unaerated soil. It would be better, however, where this system is used for the disposal of the outflow of soil-pipes, to avoid the use of wells. As a general rule, it is safer not to use for drinking purposes the water of any well near a house or a stable: practically, it is better not to use wells at all as a source of water for domestic supply. Filtered cistern-water is greatly to be preferred.

FARM VILLAGES.

"G.o.d made the country, and man made the town."

Cowper's view of the charm of country life as compared with life in the town is a very natural one. The same view suggests itself to every cultivated denizen of the city who finds himself in the country on a beautiful June morning, or under a warm September sun, or during the time of brilliant autumn foliage, or when the sun sets with a warm glow, gilding the clean, bare boughs of November trees, or when the whole countryside is covered with spotless snow, or when gra.s.s and leaves and buds and birds first feel the awakening warmth of spring. The scene is full of a charm and a novelty which appeal to him most strongly; and he believes, for the moment at least, that nothing could make him so entirely happy as to spend his life away from the noise and confusion of the town, and amid such scenes of rural peace and beauty. Filled with this enthusiasm, one builds with reference to a magnificent view, and without regard to the practical inconveniences of the site, fancying that true happiness requires only a continuance of the novel charms which have enraptured him.

The cultivated countryman, too,--one who has learned to use his eyes, and to see what nature has to offer him,--appreciates 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, s.h.i.+mmering 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 cla.s.s, and a very large one, whose opinion concerning the G.o.dlike 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 attractions of the country, which are so novel to his town-bred taste, so the countryman finds a charm in the novelty of the town. As one is led toward the quiet and solitude of the fields and woods, so the other is drawn by the life and interest of the community.

As a rule, at least in America, where the facilities for pleasant country living are far less than in England, the countryman who goes to town is less likely to wish himself back on the farm than is the town-bred farmer to long for the comforts and conveniences of his former condition.

"Man is a social animal," and the aphorism is especially true of his wife and daughter. As the lives of the wife and daughter are much more confined to the immediate surroundings of the domicile than is that of the man himself, so the question as between town and country should be considered more especially with reference to them.

There is a certain amount of truth on both sides of every question; and the one which we are now considering is not to be answered by a decision in favor of the heart of a great city, or of the entire solitude of an outlying farm. As is so often the case, its solution lies between the two extremes. If one may be permitted to imagine the conditions best suited to the perfect physical, intellectual, and social development of the human being, one would naturally think of a small town or a large village where society is sufficient, where the facilities for instruction are good, where communication with the large centres is easy, where the conveniences and facilities for household economy are complete, and where the country with its beauty and quiet and freshness is close at hand,--where one feels on this side the influence of a complete social organization, and on that the sweet breath of mother earth.

Unfortunately, these imaginings can never be freed from the practical bearing of the bread-winning and money-making interests. Men must live, not where they prefer to live, but where their interests compel them to live. The town and the country have their mutual economic duties by which their life must be controlled. All that we can hope to do is, on one hand, to ameliorate the hardness and solitude of country living, and, on the other, to bring the citizen into nearer relation with the invigorating fields and woods and boundless air of the country.

Devising no modern Sybaris, where all possible good of life may follow from the unaided operation of a perfect social and industrial organization, I propose to confine myself to the simple question of the best practical development of village life for farmers. The village or its immediate vicinity seems to me to offer the urbanist the nearest approach to the country that is available for his purposes; and in like manner village life, so far as it can be made to fit his conditions, offers to the farmer as much of the benefit of town life as the needs of his work will allow him to obtain. If those who now seek the pleasures of retirement in costly and soul-wearying country-seats would congregate into s.p.a.cious and well-kept villages, and if those who now live in the solitary retirement of the mud-bound farmhouse would congregate into villages, we should secure far more relief from the confinement of the town and a wider-reaching attractiveness in agricultural life; this latter leading to the improvement of our farming by a solution of that long-mooted problem, "How to keep the boys on the farm."

Nearly everywhere on the Continent of Europe those who are engaged in the cultivation of the land live in villages. An observation of the modes of life and industry of these villages has led me to consider whether some similar system might not tend to the improvement of the conditions of our own farmers, and to the amelioration of some hards.h.i.+ps to which their families are subjected.

In Europe, as here, the methods of living have grown from natural causes. There it was a necessary condition of agricultural industry, that those who tilled the soil should be protected by the military power of their lord or chief; and their houses were cl.u.s.tered under the shadow of his castle wall. The castles have crumbled away, and the protecting arm of the old baron has been replaced by the protecting arm of the nation.

The community of living, which grew from necessity, having proved its fitness by long trial, is still maintained; but there seems to have been no general tendency toward the formation of such little communities here. Save in a few exceptional cases,--as in the old villages of the Connecticut Valley, where protection against Indians or safety from inundation compelled the original settlers to gather into communities,--the pioneer built his cabin in his new clearing, and, as his circ.u.mstances improved, changed his cabin for a house, and his small house for a larger one, and finally established his comfortable home in connection with his fertile fields. This method has been adopted throughout the whole country; and the peculiarly American system of isolated farm-life has become almost universal throughout the length and breadth of the land.

I am not so enthusiastic as to believe that a radical change from this universal system is to be hoped for at any early day; but I believe that it is worth while for farmers to consider how far they may, without permanent harm to the interests for which they are working, secure for themselves, and especially for their families, the benefits of village life.

To this end are adduced the following examples, both of which are of course purely imaginary. The first has reference to a new settlement of wild land, where, by the Government's system of division, the boundaries are rectangular, and where the political subdivisions are of uniform measurement. The second relates to the necessary change of conditions now existing in the longer-settled parts of the country.

For this latter, the ill.u.s.tration is taken from an actual accurate survey[1] of a purely agricultural district in Rhode Island, showing the roads, houses, and field boundaries as they now exist, followed by a suggestion as to the manner in which the same division of estates might be made to conform to the a.s.sembling of their owners into a village.

[Footnote 1: A map of the United States Coast Survey.]

The Government division is into towns.h.i.+ps six miles square. It is proposed to divide each towns.h.i.+p into nine settlements, giving to each a square of two miles, or 2,560 acres. Each of these settlements should have its whole population concentrated in a village at its centre. A suitable method of division would be that indicated in Figure 11, where a public road crosses the middle of the tract north and south, and east and west. The outside of the tract, for the width of half a mile all around, is laid off in farms of 80 acres and 160 acres. These are bounded on the inner sides by a road. Inside of this road again is a series of smaller farms (40 acres), and inside of these a tier of still smaller places (10 acres), separated from the central village by a narrow road. The village itself occupies 40 acres.

The division of the agricultural land is as follows:--

4 farms of 160 acres 640 16 " 80 " 1,280 12 " 40 " 480 12 " 10 " 120

in all, 44 tracts, aggregating 2,520 acres, and averaging nearly 60 acres each, the most distant being less than a mile from the village green. This division is arbitrary; in practice, the more industrious members of the community would buy land from their less industrious neighbors, and the size and arrangement of the farms would vary. Often, too, the division would be into farms averaging more than sixty acres.

In such cases there would usually be about the same population, as the larger holders would employ more workmen.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 11.--DIVISION OF FOUR SQUARE MILES WITH CENTRAL VILLAGE.]

What is attempted is chiefly to show how four square miles of land may be so divided that its occupiers may be conveniently gathered into a village; and it may fairly be a.s.sumed, that, except in the more remote grazing and grain-growing regions, the population (including laborers) would generally be about one household for each sixty acres. In the more thickly settled regions, this limit is exceeded now; and, as population increases, this condition will extend. In any case, the principle advanced remains the same, whether there be thirty households or sixty.

A suitable division of the village is shown in Figure 12. Its centre is occupied by a public square at the intersection of the main roads. The road surrounds a piece of ornamental ground, containing about one acre.

North and south of the square are the sites of two churches, a schoolhouse, and a store and public house. This is again arbitrary; the purpose is to have these s.p.a.ces occupied by somewhat important buildings, which it will not be necessary to enclose by fences, so that an appearance of more size may be given to the central feature of the village.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 12.--DIVISION OF THE CENTRAL VILLAGE.]

The s.p.a.ces set apart for these buildings, as well as the village green, should be surrounded by regularly planted trees, such as will grow to a large size, like the American elm. But the whole open s.p.a.ce should remain otherwise free from planting. Smooth, well-kept gra.s.s, and large trees planted in formal lines, with an entire absence of fences, posts, chains, bushes, and all decorations, will give a dignity and character which an excess of ornamentation would spoil. A certain amount of judicious bedding would be permissible, but it would be best that even this should be confined to private places. Any fund available for embellis.h.i.+ng the village green will be best used in keeping its gra.s.s cut and its walks clean,--entire neatness and simplicity being its most effective characteristics.

On the streets leading east and west from the green there are shown sixteen lots 100 X 250 (one-half acre), eight 50 X 250 (one-quarter acre). These lots all open on narrow lanes at the rear. On the streets leading north and south there are twelve lots 50 X 650 (three-quarters acre), and eight lots 100 X 650 (one and one-half acres). These are the village lots proper, but the twelve ten-acre tracts which front on its surrounding street would be the residences of their owners; and these semi-detached houses--the most distant not a quarter of a mile from the green--would form a part of the village, and come within the operation of its rules of a.s.sociation. Probably the blacksmith, the wheelwright, and the builder would occupy these outlying places, with an "annex" of farming to supplement their trades.

The village lots proper are all large enough for a kitchen-garden, barn, barn-yard, &c.; and all have means of access from the rear, so that their street fronts may be kept for ornamental purposes.

It would be a good rule that no house should stand nearer to the street line than thirty feet, and that no fence should be made nearer to the street than sixty feet. This would add very much to the largeness of appearance of the whole village; would decorate every street with the ornamental fronts of the houses and with their plants and shrubbery, and would, at the same time, shut off from the ornamental parts every thing belonging to the working department of the village life. Even the baker and the shoemaker should conform to this rule, and their shops should be made to help the neatness of appearance of the village.

The larger farmers, having the most cattle, would occupy the largest lots, which would readily accommodate their larger needs. The more ambitious of them would probably buy land, for night pasture or for cultivation, from a ten-acre neighbor opposite their rear line.

The village population would be somewhat as follows: two clergymen, one doctor, one teacher, one baker, one shoemaker, one tailor, two store-keepers, one carpenter, one wheelwright, one blacksmith, one dressmaker, one innkeeper, forty-four farmers: total, fifty-eight heads of families. Probably, including hired laborers and servants, the average would be six persons to each household. This would make the population of the village about 350. No part of the whole scheme is more arbitrary than this arrangement of its human element; and no part of it would be more modified in different cases by the element of human nature. Still, this sketch of the industrial division of the community would probably be approximated in any purely agricultural village of this size,--with such changes in the detail as would come from individual enterprise or indolence.

Taking the whole area at 2,560 acres, and the population at 350 persons, we have an area of about 7-1/3 acres to furnish the support and home of each member of the community,--an amount ample for the purpose.

Figure 13 suggests the arrangement of the central open s.p.a.ce of the village,--all of which should be in well-kept gra.s.s, except where roads and paths are needed. Paths should be reduced to the least amount that will furnish the necessary accommodation, and they should be kept in neat condition. If no provision can be made for this, it will be better to leave the people to beat their own tracks across the gra.s.s as their needs direct. These beaten foot-paths are never unsightly (in small villages), for the reason that they are never large, and that they are only of such width as their regular use will keep clean: the gra.s.s maintains its effort to spread, and grows always close up to the necessary foot-way. Even in Hyde Park (London), where the people have made short cuts across the broad lawns, the paths thus marked out, and receiving no attention, are not only un.o.bjectionable, but are a charming feature of that beautiful pleasure-ground.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 13.--DIVISION OF THE CENTRAL OPEN s.p.a.cE OF THE VILLAGE.]

The foot-path indicated for the village green will be demanded by the more ambitious village improvers; but were I making an ideal village for moderate and tasteful people, the road surrounding the green should enclose only a level, close-cropped lawn, neatly trimmed at its edges, surrounded by fine and simple trees, and traced here and there with the foot-paths that honest use had marked out and made, and by the suggestive diamond-shaped track and bases of the village base-ball club.

It should be perfect in grade, in outline, in regularity of planting, and in mowing; but it should be a perfect lawn _plus_ the wear of constant use and frequent pleasure.

The second example is taken from existing conditions in my own neighborhood. The United States Coast Survey has furnished all the necessary details save the _farm_ boundaries. The field boundaries and roads are exact.

The tract is of the same size with the one just considered,--two miles square. Its centre is in one direction about two miles from a small village, and in the other about seven miles from a large town which furnishes the chief market for its agricultural products, and is the source of all (or nearly all) of its supplies.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 14.--PRESENT DIVISION AND SETTLEMENT OF TRACT IN RHODE ISLAND, TWO MILES SQUARE.]

Figure 14 shows the present settlement of this area, the houses, about sixty in number, being scattered over the whole tract, with no near approach to a "neighborhood" at any point. These are practically all farmers' houses, some trade being carried on here and there in connection with the farm-work. A few of the houses belong to farms which lie mainly outside of my lines. Deducting a fair proportion for this, and others for the wheelwright, blacksmith, &c., we shall have about the same number of farmers as in the former instance, say forty-four; and, taking the same area for the village, we shall have the same amount of farm and village property for their support.

Figure 15 shows a suitable division of property and the location of the village, on a short cross street running from one to the other of the main public roads, and extending a short distance up and down these roads.