Massachusetts is a great country of villages, if, indeed, it would not be more correct to say, that nearly all of New England is a suburb of Boston. There are no _townships_ of unoccupied lands in Massachusetts, and where, a few years prior, a stream gushed out of a swamp, turgid with the colors of the leaves and roots steeped in its waters, new villages take the place of the swamp, and the stream is seen busy with the people grinding at the mill, while from each steeple another is visible; each school-house is within sight of its like, and the well-leaved trees scarcely conceal from the inhabitants of one village the white and green of the cottages of the next town. Where such a population is found one scarcely looks for large forms or extensive homesteads; each rood of ground serves to contain and maintain its man, and the intellect of each is kept bright by the constant collision of mind with mind, and the constant necessity of vigilance to prevent encroachments or to secure the advantages of a bargain.
No one goes to the south-eastern part of Massachusetts without inquiring at least for the “farm” of Daniel Webster. It was my better lot to visit the place, and to see much of what others have of late read of. Mr. Webster purchased a large farm, which, having been in the same family almost ever since the landing of the Pilgrims, had not been disturbed by those divisions which augmented population and factory privileges effect in other parts of the state, and as the Anglo-Saxon race is remarkable for the desire to add land to land, Mr. W. has yielded to that propensity of his blood, and augmented his domains, by the annexation of two other overgrown or rather undivided farms, so that the public road seems made to divide his land for miles, and to open up for general admiration the beautiful improvements which his taste supports, and his liberality exercises.
I am not going to give any account of Mr. Webster’s place for the benefit of the agricultural society, else would I speak of his gigantic oxen, and his conquest over fell and rocks; else would I describe his swine, that seem, like the ox of the Bible, to know their owner, and to feel the consequence of such domination; else would I tell of the hundred bushels of corn which were brought forth by an acre, which ten years ago seemed to share in the common attributes of the soil of the state, viz., to present in summer the contest between a stratum of paving pebbles and some stunted grass for visibility; a contest which ceased at the approach of cold weather, when, of course, the stone became most prominent, and continued so until the snow for five months buried both parties out of sight.