type of rural citizenship, but a luminous example of that rich and satisfying blend of city and country life that is the essence of what I am saying. He divides his time between New York and Washington, London and Paris, on the one hand, and, on the other, his dear little farm in the Connecticut Valley of Massachusetts.

It is my theory, and also my conviction, that his home in the valley would not seem half so sweet, nor his senses half so keen, if he did not come there from the noise and bustle of the town to hoe a row of corn while listening to the music of the birds and breathing the incense from the earth; to walk beneath the shade of his trees; to smile, as he hears the cackle of the hens, or the cheerful munching of the old mare at her meal; to chat with Harriet on the porch, or drink from the brook before he sits down to stretch his legs. "There is a poem in stretched legs," he tells us. That is a poem, I think, born of Broadway, as much as of the corn-rows and the new ditch across the meadow. I insist upon full credit for Broadway!

Let me drive it in, because it is a vital point: Without Broadway, the valley farm would not be the joy it is; nor would Broadway be so interesting, so significant, without the valley farm. This is the verdict of the fortunate who may do as they choose. Is it not, then, sound gospel for the rest of us?

To take another example: A big New York business man wrote a magazine article that attracted wide attention, though the theme, "Farming vs. Golf," seemed simple enough. He had been in the habit of playing golf (and naïvely insists that he was a pretty fair

player, too), but when the War came on it suddenly occurred to him that he might discover a form of exercise of more creative character-possibly a more valuable contribution to his country's need-than poking little white balls across a field.

He bought an abandoned farm in the hills of Western Connecticut and proceeded to raise food for his family and the public. He tells us that his entire investment was not much in excess of the entrance fee required by one of the exclusive golf clubs near New York; yet the abandoned farm turned out to be a paying investment. That, however, was the smallest of his satisfactions. He turned over a new page in his experience. He was like the colored girl, who, speaking of the dinners provided by her young man, said: "He found an appetite on me I didn't know I had."

The successful man of large affairs became an enthusiastic farmer. He went after the record as to quality and quantity of his crops, and returned from the county fair bedecked with blue ribbons. He found, moreover, better exercise and more mental diversion in reclaiming these abandoned acres than he had ever known on the golf field. He discovered that there was no such food as the food of his own raising; and while he spends many months of the year in his city home, even there he is followed by a stream of fresh eggs, milk and fat chickens, vegetables, fruit and preserves, from the farm. Listening to him as he talks, one would think the home in the Connecticut hills the main object of his existence, and the great business over which he

presides, with its branch houses in several American cities, as well as in London, Melbourne and Bombay, only a secondary consideration.

His magazine article struck a responsive chord in many hearts, and brought him many letters of appreciation, one of which I wrote from my office in the Department of the Interior at Washington. Probably this book would not have been written at this time except for that incident, which is my excuse for the following quotation:

"Your philosophy has a distinct bearing on the garden city plans we are considering here. The number of persons who can purchase and improve abandoned farms, and give them the necessary attention, is comparatively small, and I fear it always will be: but the home-in-a-garden which we have in mind, where the man will own an acre or two of ground and be shown how to make the most of it by intensive meansapplying not only to the soil but to various kinds of livestock-will enable multitudes to take your prescription of good, useful and productive work instead of play.

"The people to whom I refer are probably not golfplayers now, but they are in need of rural experience, and hunger for some touch of the open spaces."

He

He thought it good philosophy and called for a program. I answered: "It would take a book.” retorted, "Then by all means write it."

Our problem, then, is to get the rural savor into city life; to open the way to homes on the land for the multitude of our country-minded now living within

city walls; to bring within reach of all who desire it, the experience of David Grayson and of our New York business man. The limitations as to capital and leisure mentioned in my letter must be kept in mind. It is clearly a job of social engineering.

But it can be done!

CHAPTER V

H

THE INVISIBLE CITY OF HOMES

These are the things I prize
And hold of dearest worth:
Light of the sapphire skies,
Peace of the silent hills,

Shelter of forests, comfort of the grass,
Music of birds, murmur of little rills,
Shadows of clouds that swiftly pass,

And after showers

The smell of flowers

And of the good brown earth:
And best of all, along the way,
Friendship and mirth.

Henry Van Dyke.

OW does it happen that all of our cities are surrounded by a wide belt of nearly vacant

land, which, if used at all, falls far short of its best possibilities? True, the city must stop somewhere, but why should it stop short of the genuine rural district? Possibly it is an illustration of the law laid down by Julius Seelye: "In truly living institutions, the instinct of development is wiser than the wisdom of the wisest."

These vacant areas have been waiting for something -for something more valuable than the old order of rural life; more valuable, too, than congested city life. They have been waiting for the Era of the Garden Home. Even now, those vacant spaces constitute the City Invisible.