42 TRANSACTIONS OF THE AMERICAN SOCIETY 



or patching-up copied details; believing that an inspiration will readily come to him who 

 stops thinking "business" and thinks "art;" and finally getting acquainted, to the best 

 of his abilities, with the client so as to study his character, inclinations, and needs. 



Miss Jones: Terraces are not an essential feature of Italian gardens, as they were always made to 

 fit the conditions. People copy details, not the grand idea, and think they have a garden. The Italian 

 design is homogeneous; we are apt to go to extremes in one detail. Seclusion is typical of Italian gardens. 

 In English gardens the flowers are the important thing; in Italian, the layout. The lemon tree can be used 

 there outdoors from May to Octoljer. 



Mr. Dawson spoke of the possibilities of seclusion in the garden (which may be considered as part 

 of the house), and of water in Italian gardens, used to the utmost, and the beauty attained by the free 

 use of walls at different levels. 



Mr. J. C. Olmsted does not approve of the name, "Italian Garden," in America; would call it "Formal 

 Garden." 



Mr. Vaux: The need for the formal garden is so universal in America that the near future is going 

 to see a great demand for artistic designs. 



Mr. Gallagher contrasted the lack of views to be had from Italian houses, with the American house 

 set on a hill, getting the view and also more air in summer. 



Mr. Hoth: Men build gardens because others have built them. Let us develop a garden of our own. 



Miss BuIIard writes: "I would particularly endorse what is said of the seclusion of the garden, for I 

 have long felt that much of the audacity of our young American public is due to the frightful publicity 

 of the daily life, in which the thought of any sort of seclusion is conspicuously absent." 



THE BOSTON PARK SYSTEM 



By JOHN C. OLMSTED 

 (Meeting of July 7, 1905) 



AT this, the first summer meeting of the American Society of Landscape Archi- 

 /-% tects, it seems appropriate that considerable attention should be given to the 

 parks of this city. Because I had a more or less responsible share in, and at all 

 times took part in the designing of them, it has fallen to me to tell you, before we visit 

 the parks together, some points of design which may aid you somewhat toward under- 

 standing what you will see tomorrow. I shall avoid, in the main, statistical and other 

 information which you can read in the reports and other printed matter. 



THE COMMON 



The Common — the pride of patriotic Bostonians — is part of a farm bought of William 

 Blackstone, the first settler who bought of the Indians, by the "Town of Boston," in 1634. 

 The Town, thereupon, reserved from sale substantially the present Common for a public 

 cow-pasture and training-field for the militia. Charles Street was laid out by description 

 in a vote of the Town in 1694, as was also an extension of Boylston Street westward to 

 the channel. In 1830 only was the pasturing of cows upon the Common stopped. There 

 had, however, long been a charge of two dollars for the privilege. 



THE PUBLIC GARDEN 



What is now the Public Garden was originally a part of the Common, but it was 

 cut off by the vote defining Charles Street, passed in 1694. This vote seemed to have 



