348 



We began upon that part of our ground most difficult and most 

 expensive to improve — that part where, in order to accommodate our 

 grades to those already established in the streets, it was necessary to 

 make the greatest changes. The Flatbush avenue grade had just 

 been sunk 12 feet below its previous level. The ground we had to 

 operate upon was in part a quagmire, and elsewhere consisted largely 

 of a tough indurated clay, packed with stone, and requiring to be 

 moved by the crow and pick. The whole district of our earlier 

 operations was indeed a desert of the most disagreeable character, 

 rugged, treeless, mutilated, and lying bare to the avenues, presenting 

 a general resemblance to the unimproved ground south of the Reser- 

 voir. We took hold of it first because it was the most difficult, and 

 because we knew that in removing difficulties we should be removing 

 doubts. Now, this ground appears to the visitor who drives over it 

 for the first time "as if it were exactly in the shape that is most 

 desirable ; in connects perfectly with the avenue, the boundaries are 

 hidden directly the paik is entered, good-sized trees are growing 

 over hill and dale, the meadow spaces are broad and ample, and it 

 really seems as if nature had kindly adapted this particular spot for 

 its special purpose. 



It has undoubtedly been transformed from what it was to what it 

 is at great cost, as an approach to ground of a totally different and 

 much more attractive and easily treated character. It does not, 

 however, follow that we can recommend the city to undertake a 

 similar labor on the other side of the avenue, merely to improve dis- 

 connected patches of land that have no relation to the main scheme, 

 which was based on the idea of balancing the difficulties of ground 

 on the part of the park nearest the city, by the introduction of a 

 large stretch of cheaper and more easily improved flat land at the 

 other extremity. 



We may here observe, in regard to the changes of boundary 

 which have been made since the action of the Commission appointed 

 to select a site in 1859, that so much of the park as has been taken 

 from the town of Flatbush, being an area of 228 acres, or nearly one- 

 half of all, cost five hundred and forty-three thousand. The upper 

 portion, taken from within the boundaries of Brooklyn, containing 

 350 acres, cost two million seven hundred and ten thousand dollars. 

 That is to say, for each dollar spent the city has obtained between 

 three and four times as much land where it has taken it on the Flat- 

 bush side as it has where it has taken it on the Brooklyn side ; and 

 the cheap land, on an average, is much better for park purposes, 

 and involves very much less expense for improvement than that 



