162 MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



member of the Charles River Improvement Commission, whose 

 work in investigating one of the most important problems involved 

 in the metropolitan park question ran parallel with that of the 

 Metropolitan Connnission. Mr. James Jeffrey Roche, the journal- 

 ist and brilliant man of letters, was appointed as the other of the 

 new members, but after a few months' service he found himself 

 too much occupied by his regular duties to give the time to the 

 work which he felt it demanded. Mr. William L. Chase, of 

 Brookline, was made his successor. Mr. H. S. Carruth, of 

 Boston, recently Chairman of the Board of Aldermen, and a man 

 of high business capacity for dealing with the practical questions 

 involved iu the work of such a commission, was made the 

 Secretary. Messrs, Olmsted, Olmsted, & Eliot were engaged as 

 Landscape Architects. 



Before any positive steps could be taken in the way of establish- 

 ing any of the public open spaces contemplated, a large amount 

 of preliminary work was necessary. In the first place, the land- 

 scape architects had to give a careful study to the conditions of 

 the localities ; for naturally their judgment would guide the 

 Commission iu its determinations, and the question of the proper 

 bounds — which it was necessary to agree upon before the necessary 

 surveys could be made — had to be decided. It is very desirable that 

 the boundary of a reservation for public use should follow the line 

 of a road, for the sake of accessibility and of enabling the owners 

 of adjacent property to take tlie best advantage of the benefits 

 afforded by the neighborhood of a public domain. Therefore lines 

 have to be folloAved which will give a road of easy grades and 

 agreeable conditions. This is a task not easy to accomplish, but 

 the work lias been energetically pushed, the proper studies have 

 been made, the necessary surveys have been finished, the concur- 

 rence of the local Park Boards required by the law has been 

 obtained, and already the Beaver Brook Reservation, the Blue 

 Hills Reservation, and the Middlesex Fells Reservation have 

 become public domains, in the order of their mention. 



The name Reservation has been applied to these public holdings 

 rather than that of Park for good reasons. It will be years 

 before any elaborate form of improvement will be iu order for 

 these places, either as justifiable by the resources at command or 

 as demanded for the uses of the public. These uses, while they 

 will naturally be considerable in the very near future, will for a 



