Cemeteries 



parts which have been preserved intact for 

 the sake of landscape-beauty — with tropical 

 plants and beds of gaudy flowers, and with 

 ribbon-patterns, borders, and endless puerile 

 devices, wrought with bright-foliaged plants 

 which support our climate for only a few 

 w^eeks or months and then disappear, leaving 

 dreary nakedness behind. In short, we lose 

 sight of the main purpose with which the 

 cemetery was designed, fail to keep any 

 general idea or scheme in mind, and instead 

 of a rural burial-ground produce something 

 which is a meaningless, unnatural, and essen- 

 tially vulgar compound of a cemetery, a 

 park, a horticultural exhibition, and a col- 

 lection of works of architecture and sculpt 

 ure. 



And this we do by means of a vast 

 waste of pains and money. No one who 

 has not inquired into such matters can 

 imagine what it costs to plant out, year by 

 year, the exotics which are supposed to 

 adorn our cemeteries, and to winter them 

 from one summer to another. Few realize 

 the degree to which cemetery companies 

 now compete with one another in this direc- 



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