48 



Still the larger part of the necessary bind was provided for, and we 

 were now prepared to commence active operations with an increasing 

 confidence thai our scheme was a sound one, and that as it became 

 better understood, it would prove more and more acceptable, and 

 eventually would be fully carried out. We at once, then, set about the 

 improvement of a part of our ground, with a clear foreknowledge that 

 the result would be taken by the public as a sample of what Brooklyn 

 was going to have in the way of a park. 



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

 pensive 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, tree- 

 less, mutilated, and lying bare to the avenues, presenting a general re- 

 semblance to the unimproved ground south of the Reservoir. 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 A'isitor who drives over it for the 

 first time, as if it were exactly in the shape that is most desirable ; it 

 connects perfectly with the avenue, the boundaries are hidden directly 

 the park 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 disconnected 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, 



