CHAPTER IX 

 PARKS, PUBLIC SQUARES, SCHOOL-YARDS, ETC. 



The limits of this work will allow of very little discus- 

 sion of the above lines of ornamental landscape-work, but 

 it is a subject that is attracting so much attention and so 

 much progress is being made in this kind of work that some 

 of the principles involved will be briefly touched upon. 



Nearly all of the parks connected with large towns and 

 cities are under the direction and management of skilled 

 engineers and landscape artists, and little that can be pre- 

 sented within the limits of this volume will be of value to 

 them, but in many towns and cities we find so much imper- 

 fect work, and so much of a tendency to attempt more 

 than the available funds will warrant or more than the 

 managers can master, that we cannot but offer the sugges- 

 tion that if less were attempted and the more natural fea- 

 tures were developed and improved instead of trying to 

 ape the larger parks which are far beyond them, there 

 would be less of the shoddy work done and more that is 

 really artistic and beautiful because of its perfect natural- 

 ness. 



The well-kept village green with a good lawn and a few 

 large well-grown trees in perfect condition and with no fence 

 around it is a thing of real beauty easily and cheaply cared 

 for, far exceeding many squares or small parks fenced in 

 with expensive iron or wooden fences, entirely unnecessary 

 for any purpose whatever, or elaborate fountains, and 

 attempts at statuary. 



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