SECRETARY'S REPORT. 211 



single city, large in extent, to be sure, but still, London, with 

 its great mass of moving life, its striking contrasts of wealth 

 and splendor with the most abject and heart-rending poverty. 

 Here is a map. The stranger constantly needs it. The 

 Thames, only about thirty or forty rods wide here, divides the 

 city into north and south. It is spanned by a dozen bridges, 

 the lowest of which is London Bridge, the most noted of all ; 

 most of these are on stone piers and arches, two are of iroii, 

 and some two or three are wire suspensions. The larger part 

 of the population is north of the river. 



As we look over the city the eye rests with satisfaction upon 

 the many and frequent open squares and parks, adorned with 

 trees and shrubbery, interspersed with lawns and flowers, 

 statuary or other works of art, and lakes for waterfowl. There 

 is Hyde Park, with its three hundred and eighty acres, in the 

 very heart of the town. Regent's Park, with its three hundred 

 and seventy-two acres, adorned with magnificent gardens, and 

 a zoological museum unrivalled for its excellence and public 

 utility ; connected with it are terraces and canals, occupying 

 eighty acres more. Here is Green Park, of fifty-six acres, 

 connected with St. James' Park, of eighty-seven acres. Nothing 

 can exceed St. James' Park for elegance or finished taste. Its 

 plan is perfect, and its variety and beauty a model of landscape 

 gardening. It is grazed by large flocks of sheep, which add to 

 its attractions an air of the green lawns of the country, while 

 the royal and lordly mansions which look down upon it lend a 

 charm which no similar spot of ground anywhere else can 

 boast. There is Buckingham Palace, the residence of the 

 queen, and many a mansion around which clusters a long series 

 of historical associations. 



But St. James' is in itself the most appropriately and 

 elegantly laid out of any park I ever saw. Without any of the 

 stiffness of our straight walks and rows of trees standing in 

 rank and file, the lines of beauty are preserved in graceful 

 curves, while the endless arrangement of shrubbery in clumps, 

 groups of trees and parterres of flowers, ponds for aquatic 

 plants and waterfowl, pleases the eye. 



There, too, are Kensington Gardens, of two hundred and 

 twenty-seven acres, to say nothing of private open grounds 

 within its enclosures. Battersea Park, of one hundred and 



