74 
THE GARDENERS' CHRONICLE OF AMERICA. 
plants/' which have strong horizontal branches or (lower clusters, 
like certain hawthorns or thorn apples. 
To applying the principle of restoration several chapters are 
devoted. "A Free Restoration of Ancient Illinois" shows a series 
of landscapes under glass, suggesting the beauty of vanished and 
disappearing types of scenery. "Restoring the' Romantic Types 
of Illinois Scenery" names eight types different from the prairie 
(lake bluffs, ravines, river banks, ponds, rocks, dunes, woods and 
roadsides), and gives examples of actual restorations in Illinois. 
( hi the Prairie Be Restored?" discusses prairie parks, miniature 
prairies, prairie gardens, prairie borders, wild and cultivated 
prairie, the broad and the long views, and methods of restoration. 
"Restoration Applied to Farmstead an. I City Lot" shows what can 
be done when little money and space are available. 
To applying the principle of repetition Chapter VII is devoted. 
This explains how the prairie spirit lias been brought into the 
daily lives (if rich and poor in city, suburbs and country in all 
parts of the prairie state. 
I'lii' reader will naturally ask whether the prairie style is only 
for the prairie. Chapter VIII replies that it has already 1 n 
adapted to all other kinds of scenery found in Illinois. 
A chapter on literature is the last of the series devoted to the 
prairie style of landscape gardening. 
"The Showiest Plants in the World" deals with the old problem 
of good and bad taste in a new spirit. The author assumes that 
the motives are honorable and the plants attractive, and that the 
whole question of good taste is simply one of self-restraint and 
fitness. Guided by these principles the reader may readily decide 
what constitutes good or bad taste in the use of bedding plants, 
annua] flowers, variegated foliage, everblooming flowers, "quick 
growers," spectacular forms, weeping trees, cut-leaved plants, 
double flowers and formal plants. The evolution of taste is 
described. 
The beauty of the illustrations may tempt some inexperienced 
persons to fancy that "landscape gardening is only for parks and 
rich folks." On the contrary, so far as self-expression goes, 
landscape gardening offers as great an opportunity to every living 
soul as music does, or any other fine art. Special care has been 
taken in every chapter to show how people with little money 
or space may apply the principles of landscape gardening.' A 
single prairie rose bush beside the door may be all that some one 
can afford, and that is enough to suggest the prairie spirit. 
Over fifty of the pictures indicate small or moderate means; 
only ten indicate private wealth. About thirty involve public 
expenditure, but many of these pictures show trees or shrubs 
that can be grown as well by the poor man as the rich. Thirty- 
three species of plants native to Illinois are pictured. 
While "The Prairie Spirit" was prepared primarily for the peo- 
ple of Illinois, its principles are applicable throughout the Middle 
West. Indeed, conservation and restoration are applicable every- 
where. 
CONVENTION OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY 
OF ARBORISTS. 
'TpHE first annual convention of the American Academy 
■*■ of Arborists was held in the City Hall, Newark, N. J., 
recently. The business session was opened by President 
Frank L. Driver, of the Newark Shade Tree Commis- 
sion. The address of welcome was by Spaulding Fraser, 
City Counselor, who represented the Mayor of Newark, 
who was unable to attend on account of illness. 
Herman W. Merkel, President of the Academy, re- 
sponded with a few words on the object of the Academy. 
Papers were read on "The Ministry of Trees," by Sec- 
retary Carl Banwert of the Newark Shade Tree Com- 
mission ; "The Tree Faker" by Herman W. Merkel, Chief 
Forester of New York Zoological Park : "Arboriculture 
as a Profession," by J. J. Levison, M. F., of Brooklyn 
Park Department; "Fungus Problems of Interest to 
Arborists," by R. Brook Maxwell, Forester of Balti- 
more, Aid. 
At noon, the members were entertained at lunch by 
President Augustus V. Hamburg, of the Newark Board 
of Trade, following which a tour of inspection was made 
of the arbortcultural work in the city of Newark. In the 
evening the visitors became the guests of the Newark- 
Shade Tree Commission at a banquet over which Presi- 
dent Frank L. Driver presided. 
Herman W. Merkel was re-elected president and J. J. 
Levison secretary for the coming year. 
IS "LANDSCAPE FORESTRY" A MISNOMER? 
{Continued from page 69.) 
ence of the most horrible examples of how not to do 
landscape gardening, which no practical gardener would 
be capable of perpetrating. It is impossible by means of 
words to convey much idea of what these were like, but 
the following points in a few cases will carry something 
to the imagination. 
( Ine of these novices was called in to make a plan for a 
small place of about five acres. After completion it was 
found that the plan could not by any ingenuity be made 
to fit the ground and, among other incongruities, it con- 
tained a rustic bridge. The designer had, however, 
neglected to specify where the water to flow under it was 
to come from as there was never any water, still or 
running, where the bridge was planned to be erected, 
the only water on the estate being that derived from a 
well three hundred feet deep and the nearest stream was 
three miles away. 
In a city where the appointment is political and there- 
fore the holder need have no qualifications, the park- 
superintendent asked to have a landscape gardener ap- 
pointed as his assistant and the job was given to a young 
man just out of college. One of the first attempts of the 
latter was to destroy a good lawn by cutting a large bed 
in the middle of it and "bedding out" in March some 
three hundred Easter Lilies in full bloom from a green- 
house. Three days were more than sufficient to bring 
them in a condition for the dump ; Astilbes were put in 
their place which required a less time for their destruc- 
tion. 
As this lawn was partially surroulded by naturally 
arranged shrubbery the discord thereby created may be 
imagined and it caused a deal of amusement in the city 
at the time, even among those who did not claim to have 
much knowledge of gardening, and many desired to 
know if that was the style of landscape gardening taught 
at college. This same man committed the vandalism of 
destroying some of the late Frederick Law Olmsted's 
classic work because it interfered with the view of the 
pedestal of a statue ! 
More recently the landscape work upon two new 
estates was given into the hands of a young college man. 
His plans proved him to be absolutely unacquainted with 
the merest elementary principles of art in the garden and 
that he had no knowledge whatever of horticulture. His 
planting plans called for huge thickets of shrubs all 
spaced exactly eighteen inches apart ; beds of rhododen- 
drons were in positions where they received all the sun at 
all seasons and herbaceous perennials were quite unpro- 
vided for ; perhaps he had never heard of them. 
These are only a few out of numerous examples wdiich 
could be given and I venture to assert that no practical 
gardener could have possibly performed worse work than 
that I have seen in various parts of the country as the 
result of the employment of professional landscape 
gardeners. 
College education may have some value, even if noth- 
ing more than that set forth by a prominent public man 
a few years ago, who stated that every one who could 
should go to college if only to find out the uselessness of 
college education in the practical work of life. 
Everv man should consider himself bound to acquire 
something or somehow the scientific principles of the 
profession he proposes to adopt : but the fullest knowl- 
edge of these principles alone will not carry him very far 
and, as a late instructor in horticulture myself. I well 
know the limitations of class room work without the 
opportunity to gain practical experience. 
