44 
PARK AND CE;M£TE;RY 
I 
The Evolution of the Eondon ParK S^^stem. 
The public parks of most of the great cities of the 
world, and of London in particular, have been in 
former times when first the transition from the 
uncultured to the cultured state became at all evi- 
dent, rigidly enclosed private gardens attached to 
large mansions or stately palaces, writes G. P. 
Knowles in the London Surveyor. This remark, of 
course, does not apply to all parks, for some have 
been enclosed and laid out solely for public pur- 
poses at the public expense. At the beginning and 
middle of the nineteenth century Kensington Gar- 
dens became the haunt of the general public instead 
of a rendezvous of Royalty and Royalty’s selected 
friends. 
Within the area of the County of London, about 
Ii6 square miles (nearly 74,000 acres) there are 
altogether 7,544 acres of permanent pasture and 
grass besides the other portions of open spaces, or 
about 10 per cent. This is not inclusive of parks 
which are within easy reach of the metropolis, and 
which might be classed among the parks of Lon- 
don ; of these the two chief ones are Richmond 
Park of 2,469 acres, and Eipping Forest of 5,552 
acres. 
The public parks and gardens of London, to be 
classified according to management, are divisible 
into four classes : 
(i.) Those controlled by the Crown. 
(ii.) Those controlled by the London County 
Council. 
(iii.) Those controlled by the City Corporation. 
(iv.) Those controlled by the Borough Councils. 
In the present article attention will chiefly be paid 
to Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens. 
The parks and gardens over which the Crown ex- 
ercises control include some of the most beautiful, 
the most park-like, and the largest in London. Con- 
trol is efifected through the Office of Works, though 
the actual duties of looking after the parks devolve 
upon the rangers and bailiffs. The office of ranger 
dates back as far as the time of Henry VIII. — the 
time at which the land which now constitutes Hyde 
Park came into the Royal estates. 
The annual expenditure upon the Royal parks 
PLAN OP HYDE PARK AND KENSINGTON GARDENS, LONDON. 
