August 20, 1890.] 



Garden and Forest. 



401 



GARDEN AND FOREST. 



PUBLISHED WEEKLY r.Y 



THE GARDEN AND FOREST PUBLISHING CO. 



Office : Tribune Building, New York. 



Conducted by Professor C. S. Sargent. 



ENTERED AS SECOND CLASS MATTER AT THE POST OFFICE AT NEW YORK, N. Y. 



NEW YORK, WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 20, 1890. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



PACE. 



Editorial Articles:— City Improvement Societies.— A Redwood Forest-Pre- 

 serve 401 



A Fine Bur Oak. (With illustration.) 402 



The Florida Spruce Pine Carl Mohr. 402 



Improving Plants by Crossing Professor E. S. Goff. 403 



Foreign Correspondence: — Messrs. Backhouse & Sons' Nurseries at York, 



Visitor. 403 



New or Little Known Plants : — Rosa multillora. (With figure.) C. S. S. 404 



New or Little Known Orchids R. A. Rolfc. 406 



Cultural Department : — Notes on Shrubs J. G. J. 406 



Devices for the Fruit-Garden E. P. Powell. 408 



Two Uncommon Plants IV. E. Endicott. 408 



Hardy Flowers for Florists' Use E. O. Orfiet. 408 



Alocasias IV. H. Taplin. 409 



Hardy Annuals G. 409 



The Forest: — Suggestions for Restoring Wa-sted Forests, 



Professor IV. A. Bnckhout. 410 



Correspondence: — The Effect of Seasons on Vegetation E. P.Powell. 411 



Shaftesbury as a Tree-Planter j.N.B. 411 



Tecoma grandiflora S. B. Parsons. 411 



Sargentia Greggii C. G, Pring-le. 411 



Recent Publications 411 



Notes 412 



Illustrations : — Rosa multifiora. Fig. 51 405 



A Bur Oak (Quercus macrocarpa) in Wisconsin 407 



City Improvement Societies. 



ONLY a few years have passed since the first Village 

 Improvement Society was organized, but scores of 

 these associations are now doing good work in every part 

 of the country in securing for rural communities more 

 favorable sanitary conditions, improving roads and path- 

 ways, beautifying public squares and the grounds about 

 public buildings, educating the public taste, and in many 

 other ways making country life more attractive and satis- 

 fying. There would seem to be little need for similar asso- 

 ciations in cities where the government is more directly 

 charged with the duties which these societies have assumed. 

 There is a Board of Public ITealth to look after the city's 

 drainage and general cleanliness. There are Park Com- 

 missioners charged with the supervision of its public 

 grounds. There is a Board of Works to look after the hi<rh- 

 ways, and in many cases the planting of trees; and yet 

 there is little question that an active association in every 

 city which should charge itself in a general way with 

 functions similar to those performed by the Rural Improve- 

 ment Societies would help to supplement official action by 

 directing it in proper channels and making it more effective. 

 Organization is always effective by uniting the desultory 

 efforts of individuals; and that much good can be achieved 

 in the speciel direction indicated is proved by the effective 

 work of the Metropolitan Gardens Association of London, 

 the City Parks Association of Philadelphia and the Tree 

 Planting and Fountain Society of Brooklyn. 



A report of this last-named organization has just been 

 received, and from it we learn that of the 70,000 trees now 

 standing in the streets of Brooklyn a considerable portion 

 have been planted under the auspices and at the sugges- 

 tion of this Society. After it was formed, some eight 

 years ago, many public meetings were helJ, circulars 

 were issued, and articles calling the attention of citizens 

 to the value of trees in city streets were published in the 

 daily papers. But the work was carried on in still more 

 practical ways. Various nurserymen were asked to fur- 

 nish information as to the number of trees they had in 

 stock of different varieties and the prices at which they 

 could be obtained. As the time for planting approached 



the Society secured a storehouse in which samples of trees 

 from various nurseries were kept on exhibition, and suit- 

 able persons were always in attendance to give informa- 

 tion as to the proper methods of planting, the varieties 

 most useful and the places where they could be obtained 

 at the most favorable prices. When it was desired, the 

 Society not only furnished trees at cost price, but sent 

 skilled men to plant them and charged for the special ser- 

 vice only the amount that they had paid for the labor. 

 After the trees were planted instructions were given as to 

 their care ; devices for protecting them from horses and 

 other dangers were explained, and efforts were made to 

 create a feeling that the city trees were common property 

 and that every citizen had a personal interest in preserving 

 them. In order to properly educate the young, this Society 

 urged the Legislature to pass an act for the encouragement 

 of arboriculture, and this resulted in the appointment of 

 an Arbor Day for the state, and in its celebration public 

 exercises are conducted by the various school officers 

 throughout the state and participated in by all the children 

 of the public schools. Of course, this general work is but 

 a small portion of what the Society is constantly doing. 

 As an example of its special watchfulness, it may be stated 

 that when some of the trees, notably the Maples, in the 

 city were suffering from the ravages of an insect, a com- 

 petent entomologist was called in to make a study of the 

 cause and to report upon the best means for overcoming 

 this evil. 



Altogether there is no good reason why associations of 

 this sort could not be made as helpful in the city as in the 

 country. Without naming all the directions in which their 

 influence could be exercised for good, it may be worth 

 while to indicate one in particular, and that is in protecting 

 public parks. It is not always, perhaps it is not generally, 

 true that commissioners of city parks have any adequate 

 appreciation of their true function. They cannot be trusted 

 to repel the attacks constantly made on the parks ; they 

 often side with the assailants and organize attacks of their 

 own. In this city, for example, it is constantly happening 

 that city officials who would hardly assume to make plans 

 for a monumental public building consider themselves per- 

 fectly competent to design an urban park or change the 

 design of one already made. It has never dawned upon 

 them that one of these works is or ought to be as truly a 

 work of art as the other. Only a few days ago the Mayor 

 of this city suggested in an off-hand way, and yet in his 

 official capacity, that the entire system of walks and 

 drives in Central Park should be remodeled, lie was 

 troubled by no doubt that his plan would be infinitely 

 superior to the original one, or that he was perfectly quali- 

 fied to direct such an undertaking. Similar attacks upon 

 the integrity of our parks, efforts to pervert them from their 

 highest use, and even attempts to obliterate them or to 

 confiscate them to some alien use, are happening every 

 year. Central Park has been saved as by fire, simply be- 

 cause there has been intelligent opposition to its destruc- 

 tion made in a few newspapers. These assaults will 

 probably grow more frequent and more urgent as popu- 

 lation presses about it more densely, and the time may 

 come when a well-organized defense will be needed to keep 

 its woods and meadows from being utterly trampled out or 

 covered with brick and stone. A voluntary association 

 which would, in addition to other duties, devote intelligent 

 attention to the preservation and proper management of 

 parks could find an ample field for labor in every consid- 

 erable city of the Union. 



Just a year ago we published a letter from Mr. Charles II. 

 Shinn (vol. ii., p. 39S), in which it was stated that Colonel 

 J. B. Armstrong proposed to dedicate 400 acres of magnifi- 

 cent Redwood forest to public use forever. It was there 

 said that this piece of primeval wood was of almost unique 

 value, since it has never been touched by the axe nor has 

 it been pastured. It shows the growth of the Redwood in 

 every type; in single trees, in clumps of twos, threes, fours 



