DEPARTMENT OF PARKS. 103 



An average of eighty-five men, thirteen teams and five carts were 

 thus employed. The work on the land fronting the reservoir is 

 virtually completed. There have been constructed, graded and 

 graveled 1,130 lineal feet of walks, twenty to twenty-five feet 

 wide ; one and one-half acres of lawn graded and sown and the 

 remainder laid out for plantations. The sidewalk on Flatbush 

 and Washington avenues has been graded fifty feet wide, the en- 

 tire length of the property. Excavations were made along these 

 avenues for the planting of 325 trees. Flagging was laid from a 

 point opposite the entrance to the water tower on the Eastern 

 parkway to Flatbush avenue, and along Flatbush avenue to the 

 old city line, near Malbone street. Altogether 15,690 square feet 

 of flagging were thus used. In addition to the grading mentioned 

 more than 4,000 cubic yards of earth were removed from the site 

 which will be occupied by the Museum building now being con- 

 structed for the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences. 



In Prospect Park there was considerable grading done during 

 the year. The herbaceous flower garden on Breeze Hill was re- 

 graded, the land around the Lincoln and the Maryland monuments 

 cut down to produce suitable effects, and the embankment along 

 Prospect Park West, from the Third street entrance to the Park 

 Plaza, was reformed to conform to the new wall erected on this 

 side of the Park. The construction of this wall also necessitated 

 the regrading of the sidewalk for a distance of about a third of a 

 mile. Considerable grading was done along the road outside of 

 the Park from the Flatbush entrance to the Ocean Parkway 

 entrance, and the surplus material thus obtained, measuring over 

 600 cubic yards, was utilized in raising the grade of the Ocean 

 Parkway at Church lane. 



During the year, the Children's Playground was converted 

 into a Rosery, in connection with basins for tropical and semi- 

 tropical aquatic plants. The place being low and sheltered from 

 the severe wind, and being surrounded by large trees and thick 

 shrubbery, is admirably adapted for its new purpose. The crea- 

 tion of this garden entailed a large amount of grading, the place 

 being covered with gravel and boulders to a depth of from two to 

 three feet. One thousand cubic yards were excavated in the 

 formation of thirty-four oblong flower beds, two aquatic basins 



