Hawthorne Summer Reading

28 Hawthorne Fine Art W e have just built our house in rather an out-of-the-way place— on the bank of a river, and under the shade of a patch of woods which is a veritable remain of quite an ancient forest. The checkerberry and partridge-plum, with their glossy green leaves and scarlet berries, still carpet the ground under its deep shadows; and prince’s-pine and other kindred evergreens declare its native wildness,—for these are children of the wild woods, that never come after plough and harrow have once broken a soil. When we tried to look out the spot for our house, we had to get a surveyor to go before us and cut a path through the dense underbrush that was laced together in a general network of boughs and leaves, and grew so high as to overtop our heads. Where the house stands, four or five great old oaks and chestnuts had to be cut away to let it in; and now it stands on the bank of the river, the edges of which are still overhung with old forest-trees, chestnuts and oaks, which look at themselves in the glassy stream. ” —Ha r r i e t B e e che r S towe , Our Country Neighbors, 1867 5 Hugh Bo lton J one s The Old Swimming Hole Oil on canvas, 16 3 / 4 x 24 3 / 4 inches, Signed lower left “