323 
PARK AND ce;me:te;ry 
Let US look over these pictures of very diverse 
scenes and see what features they have in common ; 
for, being all beautiful and all of the same kind, they 
must be intimately related, as are all things beautiful, 
though they may differ much more than these super- 
ficially. The first idea that strikes us is that in each 
one, in a different way, the shore line is only partially 
visible ; part of it turns a corner and disappears 
around a promontory or projection of some kind; in 
other (unless there is some very bold background like 
the Palisades along the Hudson River) a sheet of 
water of limited area always looks monotonous ; take, 
for instance, the Potomac at Washington, a stream 
of impressive size, but with low and uninteresting 
shores; or almost any large reservoir such as that in 
Central Park, New York, or Druid Hill Park, Balti- 
more. These surfaces of really noble extent always 
disappoint because they display everything at once. 
A DISAPPEARING CURVE OP THE BRONX RIVER, BRONX PARK, NEW YORK. 
the Central Park view there is a big cushion of land 
almost in the foreground, in the Pelham Park one a 
mere thin tongue almost in the distance ; but every 
one gives the impression of the liquid surface .flowing 
or standing in a great curve and disappearing mys- 
teriously behind some intervening mass. In fact, in 
every one of them is to be found the double curve, 
the foreshortened S which can be traced more or less 
clearly in any well-composed landscape painting or 
design. 
Without an intervening mass in one shape or an- 
and there is nothing beyond ; to become interesting 
they would have to be broken by large islands or 
peninsulas placed where they would break and conceal 
the bold lines of the distant shores and give them 
interest by making them recede. It is this recession 
which at once creates the feeling of the double curve 
and changes a composition of dullness into one of 
movement and vitality. 
Next it comes to us that foliage is of really ines- 
timable value in a water picture ; not one of these but 
w'ould lose most of its interest were it stripped of its 
