But the motives which had made him seek for active employment were by no means lessened after his return to his peaceful and happy home; on the contrary, they recurred with daily increasing strength; and the utter failure of all his schemes to make his country pursuits profitable, in a pecuniary point of view, made him determine upon a vigorous effort towards retrenchment, only to be accomplished by the painful sacrifice of removing his family from their "little earthly paradise;" and the cottage at Harestreet, Essex, was fixed upon as their temporary residence. This humble dwelling subsequently became so endeared to him, as the scene of some trials and many blessings, that he never afterwards sought any other home. In the last chapter of the "Fragments" a view from its windows illustrates the principles of "quantity, appropriation, and foreground;" and we refer the reader to his own observations on that home in which he resided for forty years, as any farther remark would but weaken the simple pathos of a passage so descriptive of his feelings*.
*[This cottage, with its surrounding very small garden, became, under Mr. Repton's superintending taste, a specimen of what may be accomplished by ingenuity of contrivance. The passing traveller has often admired, with a lingering eye, its pretty exterior, and those who were admitted to its happy fireside, could not but acknowledge, that comfort, with a certain degree of elegance, may be contained within a very limited space. But it is here necessary to remark, that the whole of this place has been altered so much, that the modernized remains of trellis-work, and two lime-trees deprived of their gracefully spreading arms, are all that now are left of "Repton's Cottage," at Harestreet. - J.C.L.]
