LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE. 43 



nearest park of the new system is between four and five 

 miles from the Court House, and all of them are on the 

 open prairie, and as yet far beyond the limits of any 

 semblance of city streets. They are situated respectively 

 north, west and south of the city, and are to be connected 

 with each other by a chain of grand avenues or boule- 

 vards, having roadways on each side of a central mall, 

 lined with trees and adorned with fountains and other 

 objects of attractive interest. 



The arguments most relied upon by the advocates of 

 parks have been that they serve as " lungs to the city," 

 by furnishing a magazine of pure air to supply the 

 densely peopled districts, while they provide also a place 

 of resort and recreation for the inhabitants, where they 

 may seek relief from the turmoil of the confined streets 

 in which their lives are passed in daily toil and refresh 

 themselves with the sight of trees and grass and flowers. 

 But how do these conditions apply to the case we are 

 considering? 



The streets of Chicago are all sufficiently wide to 

 afford ample ventilation. There are no densely peo- 

 pled, narrow, winding streets, courts or lanes ; and if 

 there were, what relief would they get from parks five 

 miles off ? 



Doubtless in time those parks will be enclosed within 

 the city which will grow up around and extend far 

 beyond them, but it will be no population of laboring 

 poor that will dwell in their vicinity. The palaces of the 

 rich will surround and overlook them, and it will be only 

 on an occasional holiday that the toiling denizen of the 



