ll you they were a
formidable-looking set and evidently dead game fighters!

A PRESIDENT AS COOK

White House, June 11, 1905.

DEAR KERMIT:

Mother and I have just come home from a lovely trip to "Pine Knot." It
is really a perfectly delightful little place; the nicest little place
of the kind you can imagine. Mother is a great deal more pleased with
it than any child with any toy I ever saw. She went down the day before,
Thursday, and I followed on Friday morning. Good Mr. Joe Wilmer met me
at the station and we rode on horseback to "Round Top," where we met
Mother and Mr. Willie Wilmer. We all had tea there and then drove to
"Plain Dealing," where we had dinner. Of course I loved both "Round Top"
and "Plain Dealing," and as for the two Mr. Wilmers, they are the most
generous, thoughtful, self-effacing friends that any one could wish to
see. After dinner we went over to "Pine Knot," put everything to order
and went to bed. Next day we spent all by ourselves at "Pine Knot." In
the morning I fried bacon and eggs, while Mother boiled the kettle for
tea and laid the table. Breakfast was most successful, and then Mother
washed the dishes and did most of the work, while I did odd jobs. Then
we walked about the place, which is fifteen acres in all, saw the lovely
spring, admired the pine trees and the oak trees, and then Mother lay
in the hammock while I cut away some trees to give us a better view from
the piazza. The piazza is the real feature of the house. It is broad and
runs along the whole length and the roof is high near the wall, for it
is a continuation of the roof of the house. It was lovely to sit there
in the rocking-chairs and hear all the birds by daytime and at night the
whippoorwills and owls and little forest folk.

Inside the house is just a bare wall with one big room below, which is
nice now, and will be still nicer when the chimneys are up and there
is a fireplace in each end. A rough flight of stairs leads above, where
there are two rooms, separated by a passageway. We did everything for
ourselves, but all the food we had was sent over to us by the dear
Wilmers, together with milk. We cooked it ourselves, so there was no one
around the house to bother us at all. As we found that cleaning dishes
took up an awful time we only took two meals a day, which was all we
wanted. On Saturday evening I fried two chickens for dinner, while
Mother boiled the tea, and we had cherries and wild strawberries, as