Art Out-of-Doors 



naturalistic landscape-pictures. If they were 

 better in color than they are — if the diverse 

 tints which compose them were more taste- 

 fully selected and contrasted — they would 

 still be ugly, for they would still be out of 

 place. 



We are always told that the public ad- 

 mires them.; but popular taste is not a cri- 

 terion which those who serve our public 

 can yet respect. Our public has seen too 

 few good examples to know, theoretically, 

 what it likes in the way of gardening art. 

 Naturally it likes flowers and bright - hued 

 plants of all kinds. When it sees them as 

 they are shown in the Public Garden, it de- 

 lights in them for their own sakes while it 

 rarely thinks of the general effect of the place. 

 But if it could once see this place as it ought 

 to look, softly green and quiet, enlivened 

 but not confused by a few touches of bril- 

 liant color, I am sure it would recognize 

 the improvement, and not mourn the scores 

 of vanished beds. Even to - day, I think, 

 the people of Boston take more pleasure in 

 the masses of freely flowering plants which 

 adorn the new park -ways on the western 

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