July 4, 1888.] 



Garden and Forest. 



217 



GARDEN AND FOREST. 



PUBLISHED WEEKLY II 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, JULY 4, 1888. 

 TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



PAGE. 



Editorial Articles : — Prospect Park — The Artistic Aspect of Trees. I.: 



Form. — Note 217 



Foreign Correspondence : — London Letter //'. Goldrins- 219 



The New York Flower Mission Mrs. F. A. Benson. 220 



Plant Notes ; — Notes Upon Lilacs (witli illustration) C. S. S. 220 



A Tropical Garden (with illustration) 222 



Cultural Department : — Celery W. F. 11^ 



Spathoglottia Kimballiana — Oncidium puh inatuin 224 



June Notes from the Flower Garden C. 224 



Notes from the Arnold Arboretum J. 225 



The Forest : — ^The Forest Vegetation of North Me.xico. V C. G. PringU. 226 



Correspondence 227 



PEiiiODiCAL Literature 227 



Recent Plant Portraits 227 



Notes 228 



Rett.ml Flower Markets ; — New York, Philadelphia, Boston 228 



Illustrations : — Syringa oblata, Fig. 39 221 



A Tropical Garden 223 



Prospect Park. 



PROSPECT PARK, in the City of Brooklyn, is one of 

 the great artistic creations of modern times. It is the 

 best e.xpression of the creative powers of masters in the 

 art of landscape-making-, who, more fortunate here than 

 elsewhere in features of natural beauty, and especially in 

 a native growth of majestic trees, were able to produce 

 an urban park unsurpassed in any part of the world in 

 the breadth and repose of its rural beauty. 



The condition of this great work of art, which, under 

 the most favorable circumstances, could not attain its 

 full beauty and usefulness for another century at least, 

 is, in some respects, deplorable ; and if we can judge 

 by the contents of the twenty-seventh report of the Brook- 

 lyn Park Department, the ideas held by the Board .of Park 

 Commissioners with regard to the responsibilities of their 

 office, are not calculated to inspire confidence in its future. 



The plantations in many parts of the park, were made 

 with a view to results that could only be obtained by a 

 gradual and discriminating thinning-out of many trees and 

 shrubs originally planted thickly. This has for years been 

 shamefully neglected. The Commissioners have at last 

 been impressed, however, by the immediate results of this 

 neglect, and have determined to make up for the neglect 

 of their predecessors. Their report gives no sign, how- 

 ever, that they have proceeded with any understanding 

 of the original motives of the plantations, that they have 

 desired to understand them, or have given them any con- 

 sideration. All they say of their doings, at least, indicates 

 the contrary. 



Let us consider what they are likely to accomplish. An 

 urban park is useful in proportion as it is rural The real, 

 the only reason why a great park should be made, is to 

 bring the country into the town, and make it possible for 

 the inhabitants of crowded cities to enjoy the calm and 

 restfulness which only a rural landscape and rural sur- 

 roundings can give. This is why a large park is better 

 than many smaller ones, and why all other objects must. 



in a great park, be subordinated to the one central, con- 

 trolling idea of rural repose, which space alone can give. 

 A park is useful as a playground, or as a breathing space 

 in a city, or as a picnic ground; it may be made interest- 

 ing by the plants which it contains, or by the equipages 

 vv^hich throng its drives; but its real object, its highest 

 claim, to take rank among the best productions of modern 

 civilization, is found in the rest of spirit it can bring to the 

 souls of the weary dwellers in cities. It was with this 

 feeling and with this understanding of what a park should 

 be, that Prospect Park was designed and executed, and 

 anything which is done to lessen its usefulness in this di- 

 rection is a calamity which persons who only look upon a 

 park as a good place in which to play ball, or drive a fast 

 horse, do not readily appreciate. 



To the expression of rural repose in a park, three things 

 are supremely necessary; first, a considerable extent of 

 actual space of natural landscape; second, indefiniteness or 

 mystery of the outlines of the actual landscape space, 

 obtained by curtaining off with natural bodies of foliage 

 such outside objects as the eye would otherwise rest upon; 

 third, by subordinating necessary artificial objects within 

 the park so far as practicable to its natural elements. 



The easiest way to destroy the rural character of a park 

 and limit its apparent e.\tent is to open its borders so 

 that outside objects can be seen from within. There is 

 danger that the Prospect Park Commissioners, in their 

 unadvised cutting, will do this. The thinning-out of plan- 

 tations like those in Prospect Park, where so much depends 

 upon unity of expression and harmony in composition, is 

 a matter of such delicacy that it cannot safely be entrusted 

 to any one but an expert trained in the consideration 

 of the necessities of similar cases. If the Commissioners 

 appreciate the responsibilities which they have assumed in 

 taking charge of such a creation as this park, they will 

 inaugurate a systematic thinning of the plantations under 

 some competent authority, and not trust their own 

 inspirations. 



Particular attention was given in the design for Prospect 

 Park, to providing proper accommodation for the enjoyment 

 of out-door concerts. The principal artificial feature of the 

 Park, is the noble lake ; in this lake and close to the most pic- 

 turesque part of the shore a little island was made to serve 

 as a music-stand, while on the adjacent shore a wide and 

 beautifully planted promenade, unsurpassed in extent and 

 completeness of arrangement, was to offer to pedestrians 

 every opportunity to listen to the music, which the occu- 

 pants of carriages might hear equally well from two large 

 gravel concourses, specially designed for this purpose. 

 The most costly work upon the park was used in the 

 decoration of these arrangements. Extensive refresh- 

 ment-houses, fountains, seats, broad flights of stairs, 

 superb terrace-walls of sculptured stone with bronze orna- 

 ments — all were designed as parts of one scheme embody- 

 ing the purpose of assembling great bodies of people, 

 within hearing distance of a central point. The outlines 

 of the lake for a long distance were determined with refer- 

 ence to this purpose, bridges were planned, and boat- 

 landings and approaches from all directions laid out with 

 reference to it. The expenditure for the purpose must have 

 amounted to several hundred thousand dollars. The de- 

 signed use of the arrangement was delayed until the trees 

 planted for shade should have grown to serve their purpose. 

 Now that they have done so, the Commissioners state 

 that they have satisfied themselves, by an experiment, 

 that the acoustic effect of the music from the point in- 

 tended would be a failure. There are few questions more 

 difficult and with regard to which ordinary architects and 

 ordinary musicians are more in doubt, than that of the 

 minor conditions by which the effect of music is heighten- 

 ed or marred. What recognized master in the science ot 

 acoustics the Commissioners employed, \vhat variety of ex- 

 periments were made, to what extent they were carried, 

 and upon the verdict of what jury of experts their decision 

 was reached, is not to be learned from their report. The 



