58 MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



SEPOKT OF THE COMMITTEE ON ORNAMENTAL GAEDENING, 



For the Tear 1867. 

 by h. w. fuller, chairman. 



The Committee on Ornamental Gardening respectfully report: That 

 H. H. Hmmewell, Esq., whose place was that of Chairman, declined to 

 serve in that capacity, and thereupon the writer was chosen to act in his 

 stead. The visits of the Committee during the last season, however, 

 have been very limited, and few places have been offered for their 

 insjiection. 



By the kindness of the City of Boston, whose oflBcers have taken 

 great interest in whatever concerns their public grounds, the Committee 

 were again able to examine the Cemetery of Mount Hope, which they 

 found in good condition under the charge of the new Superintendent. 

 The ribbon planting and the massing of flowers, which Mr. Atkinson 

 adopted, had not been pursued this year, and the floral display was less 

 striking; but due care had been taken of the essential^, and the Com- 

 mittee returned much gratified by their excursion. As the writer was 

 not of the party, being out of the State at the time, he can only express 

 the sentiments of those who constituted the visiting portion. And they 

 would here remark, that of all places, a cemetery is, perhaps, the most 

 difficult for the display of taste in Landscape Gardening. Superintend- 

 ents are often blamed for matters entirely beyond their control. After 

 the avenues and paths have been properly located, small lots of ten, 

 fifteen and twenty feet front, are laid out, burials are made therein, and 

 bald slabs of marble or stiff mounds for graves are raised. Perhaps the 

 owner erects some unsightly fence or monument, or insists upon plant- 

 ing his borders or graves with the most common and unsuitable trees or 

 shrubs, or with gaudy colors and frightful admixtures of all sorts and 

 sizes, and these, with forbidding fences limiting the view and destroying 

 all breadth and harmony, are scattered over the surface, annihilating 

 order and making the most skilful workman ashamed of the effect. 

 Yet, persons wholly unacquainted with the theories of harmony and 

 contrast, and who have never thought of the necessity of sunlight and 

 shadow, or of some general plan and variety of treatment, will often 

 insist upon having flowers, shrubs or trees so planted around their lots 

 that no master-hand could bring them into beauty. This evil cannot be 

 checked until the deeds of lots provide that no plantings shall be made 

 without proper approval. If the gardener who understands his business 



