DEPARTMENT OF PARKS. 13 



Two gangs of gardeners were employed in pruning and 

 trimming the trees on this parkway, which require this service, 

 so that they may be in suitable shape for the coming spring. 



On account of the almost continuous rains this season it has 

 required the service of five teams and scrapers for a large 

 portion of the time to keep the road in conditon for driving. 



THE CONCOURSE. 



The Concourse during the Summer months was policed night 

 and day, by four officers, and lighted by electricity. It is at 

 present lighted by naphtha lamps. 



Early in the year there were some 200 loads of bowlders and 

 broken stone, together with a like number of loads of brush 

 from the cuttings of the park, wrought together in a solid mass 

 and used as an embankment to protect the east end of the 

 Concourse from the action of the waves. 



This work was soon after discontinued by the Commissioners 

 by the advice of experts, one of whom was from the Geodetic 

 Bureau at Washington. 



This embankment, although left in an unfinished condition, 

 remains intact, having withstood the worst storms of the season. 



During the early part of the year there were placed on the 

 lowlands, back of the Concourse, 22,378 cubic yards of earth 

 filling, which exhausted the balance of the appropriation for 

 lilling in said lands carried over from the previous year. 



The severe storm which occurred on November 25th, broke 

 up some 500 feet of the asphalt embankment and road at the 

 east end of the Concourse, and washed many hundred loads of 

 sand over the remainder of the Concourse. 



Workmen were set at work and put that portion of the Con- 

 course which remained unharmed, in a passable shape. 



The same storm washed off some boards and steps from the 

 outside of the shelter nearest the beach ; the damage was 

 repaired at a small cost. 



