52 WORCESTER COUNTY HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. [H)00. 



servation of our city trees." This, with others, wtis selected for 

 the winter's work, and a tree committee formed. 



The story of that tree committee would be a tit subject for a 

 book. Full of hope and enthusiasm they studied the condition 

 of the street trees, found them in such a state of decline and 

 decay, so horse-gnawed and wire-burned, with no public funds 

 reserved for their protection that the city stood next to the foot 

 of the official list for wayside trees. 



Here indeed wns discouraging work for an untried club. Thev 

 planned to ask the city for an appropriation. They began by 

 writing for the papers, to arouse public sentiment, to make people 

 notice the trees. They talked long and earnestly with the Super- 

 intendent of Public Grounds, to find a lack of funds the chief 

 cause of neglect. At last, armed with facts and figures, knowing 

 full well the necessity of reclaiming the trees, if the city was ever 

 to enjoy shade, health and beauty, they sought the mayor. No 

 one but that struggling committee knows how many times they 

 found the doors closed by press of business, how many appoint- 

 ments left unfulfilled, by unforeseen absence. 



Of the mayor's approval they were assured. Many times by 

 arguments and entreaties they seemed to have convinced the 

 Board and Council, only to be told that while the object was 

 praiseworthy, the city debt was too great to allow making new 

 appropriations. 



This committee, unused to political methods and work in 

 public affairs, learned through bitter experience, how difficult 

 was the road to success, when one had for their object public- 

 welfare only. In that period of discouragement they began in- 

 dividual work on a small scale. The Superintendent of Public 

 Grounds gave them young trees, and the club induced property 

 owners to plant them, and so two hundred trees were set out 

 along the streets. 



Again they sought the city officials and pleaded their cause, 

 arguing the financial value of trees as seen in the sale of land 

 bearing shade trees in preference to treeless lots ; in the greatly 

 lessened cost of watering shaded streets ; it is safe to estimate 

 the cost as one-third less ; in the attractiveness to summer vis- 

 itors, and above all to their health-giving properties. 



