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LIFE IN MONTREAL. [Chap. VII. 



were erected on the surface ; while great injury might result to 

 a patient in a critical disease from the mere feeling of being on 

 a graveyard ; and reminded him how emphatically the city 

 had already pronounced against building over decayed bodies. 

 "The present site is eminently healthy, on the Mountain slope, 

 away from all danger of contagion ; on public property, not 

 now needed for any other purpose. It is a mere feeling against 

 it. Aldermen don't like to drive strangers along the beautiful 

 road, and say, 'That is the Small-pox Hospital/ We have 

 had to pay an enormous price for our Park ; and its opening 

 has been to many a great hindrance to its enjoyment. Before 

 we had to pay for it, we could roam freely over it at all hours, 

 and return laden with wild plants. Now the police drive us 

 out at fixed hours, and we are treated as criminals if we pick 

 fern-roots on our own estate. If the Park Commissioners have 

 robbed us of our former advantages, let them at any rate do 

 us the favour to let our patients have a little corner for treat- 

 ment which they cannot get elsewhere." 



Probably, after a time, the public would have been excluded 

 from the Mountain, if the estate had not been purchased by 

 the city ; but Philip had long felt sore that money had been 

 spent for ornament and luxury, which had been withheld from 

 the improvements which were essential to health and decency. 

 He greatly enjoyed places of public recreation. He wrote 

 (August 25) to his old friend, Mr. G. Buckton, who had 

 visited him in the spring with his daughter : " I have just 

 taken Raper to the St. Helen's Island Park : a spot of rare 

 and unexpected beauty, like an English nobleman's in its 

 avenues of noble trees, and surpassing in its views. It is a 

 grand place for our hundred thousand to picnic and bathe 

 from, and I wish you could have seen it. I never did before. 

 I must locate the wife there for a day next week." After 

 saying that they were building over the fields, near Brandon 

 Lodge, he adds, " Every available square inch of garden is 

 crammed with flowers, a case of Darwinian struggle for life. 

 You would laugh at my huge weekly cargoes to the flower 

 mission, and the vast jars of black currants. Butter beans and 



