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 wdth bright-foliaged plants 
which support our climate for only a few 
weeks 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- 
2 33 
