198 



it from Wall street would be about half the distance to the Cen- 

 tral Park. Spacious and healthful accommodations for a popu- 

 lation of 500,000 could be made within ten minutes' walk of this 

 Parkway. 



PLAN OF THE PARKWAY NEIGHBORHOOD. 



Our plan, it will be observed, covers more ground than is neces- 

 sarily required to be taken for the purposes which have been indi- 

 cated. The object of this is, that, in addition to providing for an en- 

 largement of the park advantages, throughout its whole extent, the 

 parkway may also constitute the centre of a continuous neighborhood 

 of residences of a more than usually open, elegant and healthy char- 

 acter. It is believed that such a neighborhood would not merely be 

 more attractive, to the prosperous class generally, of the metropolis, 

 than any which can be elsewhere formed within a much greater dis- 

 tance from the commercial centre, but that it will especially meet 

 the requirements of an element in the community that is constantly 

 growing larger, and that is influenced by associations and natural 

 taste that unquestionably deserve to be fostered and encouraged. A 

 typical case, for the sake of illustrating the class in view, may be 

 thus presented. A country boy receives a common school educa- 

 tion, exhibits ability, and at a comparatively early age finds himself 

 engaged in business in a provincial town ; as his experience and 

 capacity increase, he seeks enlarged opportunities for the exercise of 

 his powers, and, being of superior calibre, ultimately finds himself 

 drawn by an irresistible magnetic force to the commercial cities ; 

 here he succeeds in becoming wealthy by close attention to his 

 specialty, and the sharp country boy becomes the keen city man. 

 Trees and grass are, however, wrought into the very texture and 

 fibre of his constitution, and, without being aware of it, he feels day 

 by day that his life needs a suggestion of the old country flavor to 

 make it palatable as well as profitable. This is one aspect of the 

 natural phenomena with which we are now attempting to deal ; no 

 broad question of country life in comparison with city life is in- 

 volved ; it is confessedly a question of delicate adjustment, but we 

 feel confident that whenever and wherever, in the vicinity of New 

 York, this delicate adjustment is best attended to, and the real needs 

 of these city-bred country boys are most judiciously considered, 

 there they will certainly throng. We do not, of course, mean to 

 argue that the tastes to which we have referred are limited solely to 

 citizens whose early life has been passed in the country, but only 



