PROCEEDINGS OF THE AUTUMN MEETING. 65 



ure, botany, landscape gardening, architecture, and civil engineering 

 will be the best man to select. 



A few excellent examples of well-planned and well-managed parks in 

 the villages of this state would be of priceless value to her citizens, of far 

 greater worth than lectures or contributions to journals of agriculture. 



I can not close this paper without relating a little incident which should 

 interest all members of this society. Some one, long a member of this 

 society.— not a lay member, but an earnest worker — by some good man- 

 agement induced the board of state auditors to employ O. C. Simons of 

 Chicago to visit the grounds of the state capitol and prepare designs for 

 their improvement. The improvements were not prepared in time for 

 execution in the year of th^ir preparation. The work was delayed for 

 some reason. I have studied the plans carefully, and believe them to be 

 excellent. The planting of shrubbery is the main feature, chiefly along 

 the borders of the square and in a few other places, with a few choice 

 trees here and there, preserving the open areas as now for a beautiful 

 lawn. Our excellent Governo" Rich, not knowing himself just what was 

 the best thing to do, feared that Mr. Simons might not know what he was 

 about, and so told me frankly that he "sat down on it" — in other words, 

 he vetoed the execution of this excellent plan. I hope the members inter- 

 ested in the subject will make themselves familiar with this design, and, 

 if approved, unite with each other to help secure its execution. 



Many citizens visit the capital at one time or another; and, if carried 

 out, this design of Mr. Simons would do more than any other one thing 

 to cultivate a correct taste for the improvement of public squares and 

 village parks. 



USE OF FLOWERS. 



BY EDWY C. REID OF ALLEGAN. 



A man may engage in the culture of flowers for sake of dollars, and 

 yet be reckoned a man of business, and therefore one of shrewdness and 

 common-sense, for everybody has respect for all who are grubbing for 

 money, without much care for the means employed to gain it. But the 

 man who grows flowers simply for the delight of it, for their beauty, fra- 

 grance, cheerfulness, and refining influences — risks being set down by his 

 neighbors as a dilettant and a weakling. He may spend his leisure time 

 on the dry-goods boxes discussing politics, and perhaps be sent to con- 

 gress; or he may talk "hoss" and worry to death a ten-minute beast by 

 trying to make him go in two, and be reckoned a practical man of busi- 

 ness and a friend and promoter of noble sport. But let him spend a few 

 minutes each day among the posies, he is regarded as having a soft spot 

 in his head, and there is a feeling that a meek and gentle woman was 

 somehow unsexed by the mysterious forces of creation. 



But for this curious state of affairs, I believe, very many more men 

 would give attention to amateur floriculture. They do not dare do it, 

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