228 



PARKS AND PLEASURE-GROUNDS. 



continuance there is no possible excuse. We, may 

 profitably take lessons of improvement from the peo- 

 ple of countries whom we affect to hold in little regard ; 

 but who are, in this subject at least, a great way oar 

 superiors. — Ed. 



Sect. II. — Street Gardens. 



Allied, in some respects, to public parks, are the 

 gardens which are formed in squares, and other open 

 places in towns, and in front of streets. These grounds, 

 however humble they may seem, are very beneficial 

 to the population around them ; and they ought, there- 

 fore, to enter more into our street arrangements than 

 they do at present. They serve to spread the inhabi- 

 tants of large cities over a wider surface, they increase 

 the purity of the air, and act, in short, as miniature 

 parks. The square and the street with gardens in 

 front, judging from their paucity in most towns, do 

 not seem to be so popular places of residence as they 

 ought to be, and we can not altogether wonder that 

 this should be the case. Most of them are extremely 

 ugly, particularly when viewed from the street. The 

 objects there presented to an observer are an iron rail- 

 ing of affected finery, with a line of trees hanging over 

 it, dirty, rickety shrubs below them, patches of red 

 earth partially covered with straws ; in short, a whole 

 exhibiting a miserable aspect of squalor and discom- 

 fort. As to the plan, the dominant type invariably 

 requires a belt of trees and shrubs around the inside of 

 the railing, and a circle in the center ; the latter figure, 

 however, oc< asionally giving place to a statue or a 

 monument. If the belt is varied by a few projections 



