THE VILLAGE 457 



The first checks to the petty local land and timber thieves came 

 when permanent roads were established over which they dare not 

 reach and, more recently, from the growth of a public sentiment 

 against such encroachments which they dare not challenge. 



That this early interest in village improvement was more pro- 

 nounced in the older Eastern States, especially in New England, 

 than elsewhere, was probably due to the more compact and direct 

 method of local government represented by the New England 

 town meeting, and by the antecedents of the first settlers. Many 

 causes have contributed to the growth of this movement that 

 sprang into being in the earliest days, and struggled for. years in 

 the forests of new movements, and against the weeds of selfish 

 interest, until it is now a sturdy growth with many stout branches 

 and a promise of great fruitfulness. There has been a growing 

 recognition of the distinct utility and the continuous growth in 

 beauty of tree and shrub-planted streets and public reservations 

 and of rural roads following lines suggested by nature. This 

 growth in beauty, exercising the refining influence that such 

 growth always does, brought about such a quickening of public 

 opinion that unlovely, untidy, and unsafe public and private 

 grounds and public ways, once passed unnoticed, became so pain- 

 fully obvious that action was demanded. At the same time the 

 value of beauty, convenience, and safety as an asset was made 

 obvious by the attractiveness of towns so favored to persons of 

 culture and means who were seeking permanent or summer homes. 



A first evidence of organized effort to promote these objects ap- 

 peared in the Agricultural Societies that grew out of the earlier 

 ' ' Societies for Promoting the Arts. ' ' They were formed in South 

 Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts a few years before 

 the end of the eighteenth century. They gave considerable atten- 

 tion to the improvement of home grounds, to street-tree planting, 

 and to the preservation and reproduction of the forest. That of 

 Massachusetts, for example, in 1793, offered prizes to persons who 

 should cut and clear the most land in three years, and for the 

 most expeditious method of destroying brush without plowing; 

 but answers to questions sent out at this time showed so alarming 

 a decrease in the forest areas that the policy was reversed and 

 prizes were offered for forest plantations and the management of 

 wood-lots. This same society endowed one of the first bo1;ini<- 



