THE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY OF NEW YORK 



COUNTRY PLACES OF OLD NEW YORK 



By Richard Schermerhorn, Jr. 

 fellow, american society of landscape architects 



Lecture held at American Museum of Natural History, 

 Thursday, Dec. 14th, 1922. 



MANY years ago Manhattan was an isle of gardens. Indeed, 

 even not more than a generation ago, there were numerous 

 gardens on Manhattan Island. Time was when there were many 

 beautiful and stately country seats scattered throughout the Island, 

 from Greenwich Village on the west side and Stuyvesant Village 

 on the east side, to the northern limits of Manhattan. 



They were different from the country estates of to-day, as we 

 think of the most representative on Long Island and in West- 

 chester County. There is much splendor and magnificence in the 

 latter, and we are apt to compare them to their great advantage 

 with the older ones of our personal recollection, whose origin dates 

 back to the seventies or perhaps even the fifties. Once in a while, 

 however, we discover a country seat that has remained to us since 

 the very early generations, and though there may remain but few 

 traces of its former character, and we know that much of its early 

 beauty has departed, nevertheless, something is there that calls for 

 a second glance, and we feel an atmosphere about it that lends 

 attraction and stimulates imagination. In other words, there are 

 superior characteristics of these old estates that our new ones do 

 not possess, and these have not necessarily to do with age, but, on 

 the other hand, with harmony and scale and fitness. 



The old Colonial mansions had the truest kind of scale. They 

 were mainly simple in design, but their architectural detail was 

 nevertheless rich in every particular. There is no doubt also that 

 the selection of the site of these mansions and the treatment of their 

 landscape surroundings were given very particular attention. Per- 

 haps, the wonderful old growths of forest trees, which existed in 

 those days, helped this fitting and framing of the site and sur- 

 roundings. Perhaps the wide choice offered in the selection of 

 site was another reason, but I am inclined to believe that the 



473 



