August 



1S91.] 



Garden and Forest. 



361 



GARDEN AND FOREST. 



PUBLISHED WEEKLY BY 



THE GARDEN AND FOREST PUBLISHING CO. 



Office : Tribune Building, New Yof.k. 



Conducted bv Professor C. S. Sargent. 



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



NEW YORK, WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 5, 1891. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



PACE. 



Editorial Artici es :— An Object-lesson in Road -building 361 



New Hampshire Scenery. (With figure.) 361 



A " Massachusetts Forest." Sylvester Baxter-. 362 



How We Renewed an Old Place.— XV Mrs. J. H. Bobbins. 363 



Changes Which Trees Create The Garden. 364 



New or Little-known Plants : — New Orchids R. A. Rolfe. 365 



Plant Notes :— Some Recent Portraits 3^5 



Cultural Department:— Stray Notes from the Arnold Arboretum.— VII. . .P. C. 365 



The Persian Ranunculus Journal of Horticulture. 367 



Notes from the Harvard Botanic Garden M. Barker. 36S 



How to have Clean Flower Pots.. , C. E. Hunn. 368 



Cvpripedium Curtisii 7- Weathers. 369 



Lettuce for Summer and Autumn Use Professor Will W. Tracy. 369 



A Hardv Indian Azalea 6'. 369 



Hollyhocks B. O. Orpet. 369 



Correspondence: — A Forest Under the Equator Mrs. W. F. Wheeler. 370 



Community Gardens L. 370 



Recent Publications 371 



Periodical Literature 37 1 



Notes 37 2 



Illustration :— A New Hampshire Brook-side, Fig. 61 366 



An Object-lesson in Road-building. 



THE trustees of Cornell University at their recent meet- 

 ing took action which promises to give important 

 assistance to the movement for reform in the construction 

 and care of country roads. Whenever a community is 

 urged to mend its highways, the usual response is the 

 inquiry, What kind of roads shall we build? This is a 

 simple and pertinent question, but in most cases it is a 

 difficult one to answer. The subject of road-construction 

 is not so thoroughly and generally understood that it is an 

 easy matter for the intelligent people of any community 

 to say what form of road-bed would best suit the condi- 

 tions of the country and the capabilities of the tax-payers. 

 There are whole counties in the rural districts which do 

 not contain a single engineer who is competent to give 

 professional advice on a matter of this sort, and there are 

 hundreds of square miles which do not contain a single 

 rod of roadway which can be used as an example of good 

 and economical construction. It is, therefore, a matter of 

 prime importance to multiply examples of good roads, so 

 that their advantages can be appreciated and their con- 

 struction understood. 



Now, the action of the trustees of Cornell University is 

 particularly encouraging, in that it does propose to furnish 

 the necessary object-lessons for studying the practical 

 benefits of the best available roads, and to offer accurate 

 explanations of the methods used. It was on motion of 

 President Andrew D. White that a resolution was adopted 

 directing the Professor of Civil Engineering, the Professor of 

 Agriculture, and the Professor of Horticulture in the 

 university to prepare a plan for putting the roads in the 

 university property into the best possible condition. 

 These officers are instructed to use the material which 

 shall be most suitable and economical, preferably such as 

 can be obtained in the neighborhood of the university, and 

 that the project shall be carried out with a view to secure 



thoroughness and permanence, and, at the same time, with 

 the strictest regard to economic construction. The com- 

 mittee is to prepare estimates of the cost of various methods 

 of road-building and improvement, and they are advised 

 that it is the opinion of the board that the different roads 

 should not be all constructed on one plan, but upon the differ- 

 ent systems, which experience elsewhere has proved to be 

 worthy of a trial. It is, of course, understood that a care- 

 ful account shall be kept, not only of the cost of construct- 

 ing these various roads, but of maintaining them. It is 

 further ordered that, when any road shall have been com- 

 pleted, an inscription shall be set up near it, at some point 

 within public view, giving in detail, for the information of 

 the public, the cost of a mile of such a road. At a later 

 period a statement shall be added as to the average cost 

 of its maintenance by the mile every year. 



In more than one of our agricultural colleges courses of 

 lectures are already given on road-construction, and it is 

 certainly important that these institutions, which are 

 founded by the bounty of the Government for the promo- 

 tion of agriculture and the mechanic arts, should give in- 

 struction on a subject which is so vital to these interests. 

 But this is one step in advance, and will offer opportuni- 

 ties for investigation to every one who wishes to estimate 

 the advantages of good roads over bad ones, and to com- 

 pare intelligently the merits of one good road with another. 

 The influence of these model roads will extend beyond the 

 immediate range of the community whose members ride 

 over them daily, for the university attracts many visitors 

 as a growing centre of interest to all interested in rural 

 affairs in one way or another, and besides this, its profes- 

 sors, who publish bulletins of progress and who attend 

 farmers' institutes in various parts of the state, will not fail 

 to sound the praises and illustrate the value of these 

 model highways. 



It is altogether proper that the Professors of Agriculture 

 and Horticulture should -unite with the Professor of Civil 

 Engineering in this matter. One of the most important 

 matters in road-construction is proper drainage, and those 

 who deal with soils should be competent advisers in 

 the disposition of surplus water. Besides this, a road 

 means something more than a mere wheelvvay. It should 

 not only be a smooth surface to ride over, but it should be 

 a pleasure to the eye. Even in its grading and alignment 

 the appearance of the country should not be neglected, 

 and on its borders the question of what to plant and how 

 to plant, what vegetation to encourage and what to destroy, 

 are matters in which the counsel of a professor of horticul- 

 ture and landscape art ought to command respect. 



New Hampshire Scenery. 



THROUGHOUT the entire broad belt of parallel moun- 

 tain-ranges included in the Appalachian system and ex- 

 tending from Quebec to Alabama, there is hardly a square 

 mile in which the scenery is altogether tame Or uninterest- 

 ing. Persons who have been born and reared among these 

 foot-hills or in these mountain valleys are almost invariably 

 depressed when they find themselves in a land which is flat 

 and comparatively featureless, because the variety of 

 prospect which arises from a diversified surface has come 

 to be a part of their mental conception of a country which 

 is home-like and hospitable. From every elevated point 

 in all this region one can enjoy a picture which has a char- 

 acter of its own, and yet shows a kinship to all the rest. 

 The constitution of the forest may vary, the sky-line of the 

 distant mountains may have a different sweep, the flowers 

 by way-side or by brook-side may be unfamiliar, but, after 

 all, a subtle relationship can be traced between them all, 

 so that one who has passed his life among the luxuriant 

 forests and towering heights of western North Carolina will 

 find enough that is distinct in the scenery of New Hamp- 

 shire to invest it with the charm of novelty and yet enough 

 that is familiar in its character to remind him pleasantly 

 of home. 



