tion, to areas the least likely to be upset by such construction. 

 On the other hand, in areas that are likely to be upset by such 

 construction, improvements in the vegetation should be under- 

 taken only when the desirable changes in the paths and roads 

 seem, because of lack of funds, unlikely to be made for so long a 

 time that the value of the temporary improvement in the vegeta- 

 tion would, in the meantime, justify the money and effort ex- 

 pended on it. 



6. Qualities generally to be sought in improving the vegetation 

 through better maintenance. The esthetic qualities to be sought and 

 developed in the care of the vegetation must of course vary wide- 

 ly. Anything approaching a stereotyped effect, which one seeing 

 elsewhere would at once recognize as the "Botanic Garden style" 

 is to be avoided at almost any cost. But some qualities are desir- 

 able nearly everywhere, qualities now too often lacking. The 

 plants should look well-nourished and vigorous. No pains should 

 be spared, of the kind a good plantsman best knows how to give, 

 in building up the fertility of the soil in those respects necessary 

 for the healthy typical growth of each kind of vegetation in its 

 place, in adjusting different kinds of plants to the places most 

 favorable for their healthy continued growth, and in fighting 

 their enemies. One of the agents destructive to this quality is 

 the public; in its careless or wanton injury of plants by trampling, 

 breaking and deliberate picking. Both constant watchfulness 

 by a sufficient number of maintenance men and the promptest 

 possible restoration of injuries when they occur are essential to 

 keeping up a good standard in this quality. Nothing encourages 

 depredations so much as the evidence of previous depredations 

 supinely accepted. 



Hence there is no question but that the Garden should be so 

 planned as to be closed at night and that there should be uni- 

 formed guards on duty when it is open; not merely a few City 

 Police temporarily assigned to duty here, but special Botanical 

 Garden Guards forming part of the Garden's maintenance force, 

 carefully selected and trained for the double purpose, first, of 

 guiding and assisting the public to get the greatest legitimate 

 benefit out of what the Garden has to offer, and, second, of pre- 

 venting those individually trifling abuses of the Garden which 

 in cumulative effect tend so greatly to make it shabby. 



An important quality, hard to describe in positive terms, is 

 one which is the reverse of "weediness." It is not necessarily 

 " tidiness." That may be highly appropriate in some sophisticated 

 places: on clipped lawns, among garden beds of a frankly arti- 

 ficial man-made sort, on paths and roads and picnic grounds; but 



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