It will be expected, however, that the writer of this notice will take the reader to the privacy of Elmwood itself, not in this general way, but at some particular time before its owner discontinued his method of fire-side traveling under the care of safe and comfortable household gods, and tempted the real ocean to find an eight-years’ exile. The house--an old-fashioned, roomy mansion, set in a large triangular wooded space, with grassy areas, under the brow of Mount Auburn--has been familiarized through description and picture; and the author himself, of medium height, well set, with a substantial form and a strikingly attractive face, of light complexion, full eyes, mobile and expressive features, with the beard and drooping mustache which are so marked a trait of his picture, and now, like the hair, turning gray,--he, too, is no stranger. Some ten years ago this figure, in the “reefer” which he then wore, was well known in the college yard, giving an impression of stoutness, and almost bluffness, until one caught sight of the face with its half-recognition and good-will to the younger men; and in his own study or on the leafy veranda of the house, one perceived only the simplest elements of unconscious dignity, the frankness of complete cultivation, and the perfect welcome. If one passed into his home at that time he would have found a hall that opened out into large rooms on either hand, the whole furnished in simple and solid fashion, with a look that betokened long inhabitancy by the family; and on the left hand he would have entered the study with its windows overlooking long green levels among the trees on the lawn--for though the estate is not very extensive in this direction, the planting has been such that the seclusion seems as inviolable as in the more distant country. The attachment of its owner to these “paternal acres” is sufficient to explain why when others left Cambridge in summer--and then it is as quiet as Pisa--he still found it “good enough country” for him; but besides this affection for the soil, the landscape itself has a charm that would content a poet. To the rear of this room, or rather of its chimney, for there was no partition, was another, whose windows showed the grove and shrubbery at the back toward the hill; and this view was perhaps the more peaceful.