Brookside

“ We've tried to persuade her to stay, but it seems the summer is a very bad time to be away from a farm. But a week from to-morrow, if you are all very good and help me as much as you can, I will take you to Brookside to visit Aunt Polly for a month, or as long as she can stand four active youngsters in her quiet house. ”

“ Bobby's all ready to pack 'em as soon as he gets back."
"If you don't pack something pretty soon, the house won't hold you," observed Mother Blossom, smiling. "You see, Twaddles dear, Mother doesn't believe you will need many toys at Brookside. There will be so many wonderful new out-of-door things for you to play with. ”

“ The next day the four children and Mother Blossom and Aunt Polly, with Linda and Jud part of the time and Spotty and Poots in constant attendance, explored Brookside thoroughly.
They saw the poultry yard, where ducks and chickens and guinea-hens and one lame turkey lived happily together. The other turkeys roamed all over the farm, and Aunt Polly said that at night they slept out of doors in the trees. She said they would be sick if cooped up in houses, and that they had to roam half-wild to thrive. ”

“ When both boys said they had never been on a real farm, the driver, whose name, he told them, was Gus Rede, had so much to say about the fun that awaited boys on a farm and especially such a fine place as Brookside that before Bobby and Twaddles knew it the bus had driven up to the post-office and there was dear Aunt Polly waiting to welcome them.
"Bless their hearts," she said warmly, when she had kissed Mother and had hold of a child with either hand. "Are they all tired out, poor lambs? It's a fearful place to get to, especially the first trip." ”

“ Few persons ever found their way to Brookside Farm except on business, fewer still cared to ask who kept the fences and outhouses in such good order; and though Owen Griffith's house was by the roadside, ordinary passers-by were not likely to stop and put such questions, even if they gave the walls a second glance.
But Robert Jones had become a thriving man of business. He had increased the number of his team, and still travelled the country round with culm and peat, and clay and lime. ”

“ Now great indeed was the joy in Brookside, and great joy and feast they made; and the Lady of the Castle sat at the high-table, clad in golden garments, at a glorious banquet which was held every night of the octave of the day when they had first heard these good tidings. But when the Carline saw the sadness of the Maiden because of it, she said to her: "Nay, nay, my child, put on a good countenance and up with thine heart. For every tale is good till the next one is told ”

“ Spotty wagged his tail as they drove off, but he would not follow the wagon. He knew it was his place to stay and take care of Aunt Polly.
The mill was about four miles from Brookside, and the children enjoyed the drive intensely. Good-natured Peter allowed each one 84 to “drive,” holding the reins carefully as he told them, “Because,” said Peter seriously, “even if you’re only learning, you might as well begin right.”
When they reached the mill, Jerry and Terry were tied to a post and Peter and the children went inside. Bobby was rather disappointed with the outside of the mill ”

“ And if Meg’s going to stop learning music every time a new plan comes up, she’ll grow up to be terrible ignorant of lots of things.”
“All right, I’m going,” said Bobby quickly. 39 “An’ you’ll be through by the time I get back, Meg. Then I guess we can pack the toys.”
Twaddles, left alone, wandered up to the sewing room.
“Hello, Twaddles,” said Miss Florence pleasantly. “Have you come up to see what pretty dresses Dot is going to have? And what is this I hear about every one going to Brookside?”
“We’re going to see Aunt Polly,” explained Twaddles. “And, Mother, can we take toys? ”

“ So that it may be said, the city proper to-day stands consolidated on one side of the ancient neck with Roxbury and Dorchester, and on the other with Roxbury and Brookline. There still remain, however, a section of Charles River, forming a bay of itself, between Boston, Cambridge, and Brookline, and a considerable portion of the South Bay between Roxbury and South Boston. Brookline—originally Muddy Brook—was formerly considered as belonging to Boston, and its lands were apportioned among the early settlers of the town for agricultural purposes and the keeping of cattle. ”

“ Brookline is the wealthiest of the residential suburbs of Boston; and contains a number of beautiful estates and homes. Within its limits are the villages of Cottage Farm, Longwood, and Reservoir Station, or Chestnut Hill—the Chestnut Hill reservoir is just beyond the township. Brookline has an excellent public library. At Clyde Park are the grounds and club-house of the Boston Country Club. Brookline has long been regarded as a model city suburb. ”

“ Brookland, hard to get at, stands on the great road which runs south- westward out of the Marsh and brings you at last out of Kent into Sussex at Rye. It was there I lingered a little to say farewell. As one looks at evening across that vast loneliness, so desolate and yet so beautiful and infinitely subject to the sky, lying between the hills and sinking so imperceptibly into the sea, one continually asks oneself what is Romney Marsh, by whom was it reclaimed from the all-devouring sea, what forces built it up and gathered from barrenness the infinite riches we see? ”

“ The village of Brookport, Long Island, is a summer place. It lives, like the mosquitoes that infest it, entirely on its summer visitors. At the time of the death of Mr Ira Nutcombe, the only all-the-year-round inhabitants were the butcher, the grocer, the chemist, the other customary fauna of villages, and Miss Elizabeth Boyd, who rented the ramshackle farm known locally as Flack's and eked out a precarious livelihood by keeping bees. ”

“ Auspiciously dawned the settlement of Brookfield, which now bid fair to become early populated by a religious, intelligent and industrious people. But the spirit of speculation came also. The same year that Stephen Hoxie and Capt. Brown came in, Michael Myers, Jedediah Sanger and John I. Morgan, purchased all the unsold lands of Brookfield, together with Sangerfield. ”

“ The most impressive part of the spectacle was the defunct giantess, whose wide-spreading draperies and head-gear, as Brooks came down with a well-studied crash, took up so much of the floor that the rest of us had no room left to die in dignity. The piece was so much of a success that we performed it again at the house of Theodore Lyman, in Brookline,—and still again, at Chickering Hall in Boston.
Though Brooks could frolic upon occasion, his mood in his student days was prevailingly grave, and as he matured, warmed, and deepened into earnest religious conviction. ”

“ Thus having proved the origin of the good people of Brookhaven, it follows as a matter of course, that they were not only a pious people, a church-going people, but also great lovers of order and decorum. Happily, so important a conclusion does not rest for its authority on mere inference alone ”

“ It is on the eastern side of the central portion of the county of Franklin, near the head-waters of an unnamed branch of the Kennebec. On the map he used, there is no town located very near. Brookdale, no doubt, was a name of his own invention.
All the places and persons described existed in his mind with as much distinctness, apparently, as if the scenes had been long familiar to him, and the persons were those with whom he was intimately acquainted. To the only friend with whom he freely conversed upon the subject, he always spoke of them as really existing. ”

“ I looked at her in a way that I think Brooksmith himself would have approved, and then I answered: "Yes, the Offord Arms." What I had meant of course was that for the love of art itself we ought to look to it that such a peculiar faculty and so much acquired experience shouldn't be wasted. I really think that if we had caused a few black-edged cards to be struck off and circulated—"Mr. Brooksmith will continue to receive on the old premises from four to seven; business carried on as usual during the alterations"—the greater number of us would have rallied. ”

“ Crossed the dividing ridge between the Mississippi and Missouri rivers, two of the great rivers of the world. Most of the country is hilly, timber is plenty, and the soil middling. Brookfield is exactly midway between the two rivers. The railroad company has its machine shops here, and the town is in a flourishing condition. The country around is beautiful and productive. It is a charming locality for a [349] home. Rode into the country the next day, Sunday, eight miles, and talked to the people; returned in the afternoon, and lectured to a fair congregation. ”

“ On the whole, again, from the social point of view, the Brook Farm experiment was eminently successful. We were happy, contented, well-off and care-free; doing a great work in the world, enthusiastic and faithful, we enjoyed every moment of every day, dominated every moment of every day by the Spirit of Brook Farm. ”

“ It's true that the subject of my meditation was ever the same—ever "It's all very well, but what will become of Brooksmith?" Even my private answer to this question left me still unsatisfied. No doubt Mr. Offord would provide for him, but what would he provide?—that was the great point. He couldn't provide society; and society had become a necessity of Brooksmith's nature. ”

“ A bird sang in perfect tune with his mood. He was bound for a place which had a romantic interest for him: the unoccupied parsonage, which he could occupy were he supplied with a salary and had a wife. He loved to sit on the back veranda and dream. Sometimes he had company. Brookville was a hot little village, with a long line of hills cutting off the south wind, but on that back veranda of the old parsonage there was always a breeze. Sometimes it seemed mysterious to Wesley, that breeze. It never failed in the hottest days. ”

“ Mr. Offord, the most agreeable, the most attaching of bachelors, was a retired diplomatist, living on his pension and on something of his own over and above; a good deal confined, by his infirmities, to his fireside and delighted to be found there any afternoon in the year, from five o'clock on, by such visitors as Brooksmith allowed to come up. Brooksmith was his butler and his most intimate friend, to whom we all stood, or I should say sat, in the same relation in which the subject of the sovereign finds himself to the prime minister. ”

“ As though Niagara were suddenly turned upon the hill-side, a vast volume of water swept downward, hissing, foaming, rolling over the rocks, and the leaping spray dashed high in air, as the black wealth of waters came surging down into the ravine.
"A cloud-burst, by all that's holy!" screamed Brooks, as he sprang down the grassy side of the bluff. "Up with you, up the hill-side, for your lives!" The dancers, faltering through the sudden flutter of the band, for the first time looked upward, and saw the peril. ”

“ POSSIBLY it may have occurred to the reader to wonder whether in a community at once so erudite and progressive as Broxborough—we possess both a cathedral close and a linoleum factory, you will remember—there can have been no official alternative to Twenty-one, The Common, no public lecture courses.
In truth, Broxborough once had all these things. Before the war there existed an institution known as Broxborough Pantheon. Here was an excellent library of reference; lectures and classes, too, were constantly in operation throughout the winter months. ”

“ Offord he certainly would have found Brooksmith wanting, and indeed the laxity of his employer on this score was one of many things he had had to condone and to which he had at last indulgently adapted himself.
I remember the old man's saying to me: "Oh my servants, if they can live with me a fortnight they can live with me for ever. But it's the first fortnight that tries 'em." It was in the first fortnight for instance that Brooksmith had had to learn that he was exposed to being addressed as "my dear fellow" and "my poor child." ”

“ Jim Dodge had been hoeing potatoes all day. It was hard, monotonous work, and he secretly detested it. But the hunting season was far away, and the growing potatoes were grievously beset by weeds; so he had cut and thrust with his sharp-bladed hoe from early morning till the sun burned the crest of the great high-shouldered hill which appeared to close in the valley like a rampart, off Grenoble way. As a matter of fact, the brawling stream which gave Brookville its name successfully skirted the hill by a narrow margin which likewise afforded space for the state road. ”

“ The villages in general lie back under the shelter of the downs some distance from the shore; a coastguard station, a lonely farm house, or some fishermen's houses as at Brook, forming the only habitations of man we come to along many miles of shore. Brook Point is a spot of great interest to the geologist. Here we come upon Wealden strata somewhat older than any in Sandown Bay. The shore at the Point at low tide is seen to be strewn with the trunks of fossil trees. They are of good size, some 20 ft. ”

“ Ripley was largely in charge, and it was not until early fall—September 29—that the Brook Farm Institute of Agriculture and Education was organised as a kind of joint stock company, not incorporated.
A seeker after country quiet and beauty might easily be as much attracted to-day by the undulating acres of Brook Farm as were those who sought it sixty years ago as a refuge from social discouragement. The brook still babbles cheerily as it threads its way through the meadows, and there are still pleasant pastures and shady groves on the large estate. ”