“Roanoke is the most progressive city in Virginia--a bustling, busy, modern city, with no distinct flavor of the old régime in its business life. All sorts of progressive people are there. Only in the home of these splendid ancient families which have survived the war, the reconstruction period and the fatal ‘boom’ of the New South and come out stronger and better for it does one find the indestructible atmosphere of old Virginia, exquisite and indescribable unless you know Sarah and her folks--but this one is all about Araminta--Araminta who drew her own plans and stood over the carpenters and made them build her house her way and thus give to it the irregularity and felicitous crudeness which is its greatest charm. “As to folks--there is a lovely diversity of them here. Virginia has always been rich in folks. Araminta has for neighbors the cosmopolitan folks of Roanoke, the wonderful and noble people from the nearby college at Hollins, and the plain, sturdy farmers of the Cove. Many books might be written about all of them. Each neighborhood represents a phase of life, and Araminta rejoices in her friendship with all of them. “The college is a little world in itself--‘green little world amidst the desert sands’ of life is an expression that fitly describes any place made beautiful by fine ideals and fine externals. Hollins is an historic place, for many years devoted to the higher education of women. The atmosphere of such a place is felt palpably in the vicinity, but it is of the people here in the Cove that I wish to speak particularly. Their little farms--their quaint homesteads--cling to the feet of the mountain and suggest romances such as John Fox or Lucy Furman might write. We went to a little white church at the foot of the mountain yesterday. I never did see such a flood of June sunshine as filled the Cove and made the Blue Ridge seem a deeper hue.”