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 im- 

 perfect 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 

 features 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 naturalness. 



The well-kept village green with 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 ex- 

 ceeding many squares or small parks fenced in with expen- 

 sive iron or wooden fences, entirely unnecessary for any 



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