MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 123 
Shaw used to say when planting them that he did not expect 
to live to see these trees reach maturity; that he was 
‘‘planting them for posterity.’’ But nearly all of that 
splendid family which he had nursed and reared were fully 
grown when his coffin passed under their shadowing canopy 
of leaves to the Mausoleum in the Garden. The Park con- 
tains, including the surrounding strip, 276 and “oo acres; 
and nothing has been omitted, apparently, which could make 
the perfection of a pleasure ground. The walks, the drives, 
the ornamental water, the labyrinth, the shady groves, the 
well-kept grass and fragrant flowers, form a combination of 
attractions which no lover of Nature can resist. In the 
midst of these rare surroundings, like jewels in a worthy 
setting, are three statues of heroic size by Baron von Mueller, 
of Munich: Shakespeare, Humboldt, and Columbus. These 
noble bronzes are not merely works of art which any city 
in any country would be proud to possess, but they are 
curiously unique. Adelaide Neilson—whose judgment in such 
matters may be trusted— declared that ‘‘she had seen every 
memorial of Shakespeare of any consequence, public and 
private, in existence; and that this one was, in her opinion, 
decidedly the finest.’’ The niece of Humboldt, after seeing 
this statue of her uncle at Munich, wrote Mr. Shaw, thanking 
him for the high honor conferred upon her family, and said 
Europe had done nothing comparable to it for the great 
naturalist. We know America has not; and we know, too, 
that neither Europe nor America has a monument to the 
discoverer of the New World at all comparable to the Colum- 
bus in Tower Grove Park. As has been well said: ‘‘If 
dumb metal could speak, the greatest of poets and the great- 
est of naturalists and the greatest of discoverers would salute 
each other across these verdant spaces and join in thanking 
the man who has bestowed upon them such generous and 
graceful immortality.’’ 
What the Missouri Botanical Garden is now, and prom- 
ises to be hereafter, this volume will sufficiently tell. With 
Garden and Park present and prospective before us, and 
realizing as far as possible the contributions to human knowl- 
edge and human happiness which must flow from them in 
years to come, we may well say of Henry Shaw, what is 
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