27 . 
NATURE NOTES. 
complaint. Prompt action in such cases is extremely important, 
for the damage once done cannot be remedied. 
West Square, to which we referred (p. 143), is in private 
hands ; so far nothing has been done, nor has our private letter 
received the courtes)' of an acknowledgment. As every house- 
holder in the Square pa}^s 13s. annually for keeping it up, it is 
only reasonable that something should be done to replace the 
trees which are dead or dying, and to make some return for the 
amount paid. 
We have held over an article by an expert on the state of the 
Embankment Gardens, to which we also called attention, in the 
hope that the London Count}- Council may take the matter in 
hand before the time for planting summer flowers arrives. 
There can be no difficulty in providing at small cost an efficient 
border display both of annuals and perennials, in addition to the 
“ bedding-out,” and it is to be hoped that some member of the 
Parks Committee — whether “ Moderate ” or “ Progressive ” 
matters nothing — will make it his business to see that this is 
done. We shall be glad if at the same time something can be 
done to beautify such small pieces of ground as that at the foot 
of Blackfriars Bridge, on the Surrey side, now occupied by a 
dreary array of stunted shrubs ; this is under the control of the 
City, not of the Council. 
Mr. Sidney Webb has lately pointed out with pardonable 
pride the excellent work done by the London County Council in 
providing open spaces. Our attention has, however, been called 
to the fact that the Council failed to secure a space in M'hite- 
chapel, where such an opening is urgently required, and that the 
ground in question has already been partly built over ; and it 
has been suggested that a protest against this neglect might fitly 
appear in Nature Notes. The record of the Council in matters 
of this kind is so good that in the absence of a complete know- 
ledge of the facts we can hardly take this step ; but we are making 
enquiries, and shall probably return to the subject. 
We cannot too strongly impress upon Selbornians the 
importance of taking an active interest in everything which 
tends to the beautifying of our towns and cities by the introduc- 
tion and protection of trees and gardens. It is not sufficient to 
secure an open space : that is only the first step ; the next is to 
utilise it. As an example of how not to do it, we may take what 
has been done at High Wycombe. 
Twenty-five years ago there was in one of the principal 
thoroughfares a flat-iron-shaped island of garden. We are not 
quite sure whether it was a private garden, or whether it be- 
longed to the town and was hired, but we remember being taken 
into it one tulip-time, and feasting our eyes on the quaint and 
stately and various-coloured blossoms. From that time we date 
our love of tulips. The owner of the tulips and the tulips them- 
selves have gone ; so has the garden. In its place is a paved, 
raised place, bordered at intervals by big, heavy, ugly boxes, 
like giant tea-chests, each containing the remains of a tree. 
