A Sense of Humus

HERE is a book for all who have ever had or who have ever dreamed of having a farm. Mrs. Damon has written with affection and humor of the trials and tribulations involved in turning rocky New England soil into fertile farm land. The first thing one needs is humus; the second, a “sense of humus.” Mrs. Damon emerges in the book as a sort of female Robinson Crusoe toiling for survival in New Hampshire with her man Friday — in this case the hired man, Samule. With wit and wisdom the author sings of farms and the man Samule, the rustic kindly neighbors, her cocker spaniel Mickey, cultivating, planting, making maple sugar, and just life in general. “Humility, you know, is pride turned inside out and worn that way to attract attention.” She has created, in a way, a Robert Frost poem in prose, for the book is a hymn to nature with an ever present and ever welcome humorous obligato.