PARK AND CEMETERY, 
38 
CONTRIBUTED CRITICISM. 
The Use of Criticism. 
Very many of the technical and trade journals 
treat criticisms as though they were rattlesnakes, 
poisonous alike to them and their readers; and a 
scurrilous, unfair, untruthful criticism may be so, 
but not a fair and truthful and temperate one which 
avoids personalities. Such critiques are likely to be 
the most valuable matter which can appear in print. 
It is true, no doubt, that praise and optimism is 
the most agreeable to anybody but a born cynic, 
but no journal devoted to art and culture — no, nor 
all of them- — can do justice to the multitude of good 
things accomplished, and the good works need but 
little laudation in any event. 
It is the ignorance, the heedlessness, the bar- 
barity, the jobbery, the bribery, and the vice that 
need more attention than most journals afford them. 
Their perpetrators need to be put upon the 
defensive, and it is a very healthy sign to find that 
even the least of them are thin-skinned enough to 
make a defense. The recent communications of a 
Park Board in repudiation of politics, is one of the 
best signs of the times, and almost too good to be 
true. It is certain it would never have been offered 
had it not been that they were criticised. 
Oh! if it could be believed that more of the 
same sort existed! what hope there would be for 
the good gardeners of the country. They would 
no longer look askance at Brooklyn, and Chicago, 
and Buffalo, and wonder how it happens that the 
best men fail to stay at those places? They would 
cease to rack their brains for an explanation of the 
fact that carpenters and coachmen, cigar makers 
and chair menders are made Superintendents of 
Parks, and that gardeners (?) are given subordinate 
positions under them if they are employed at all. 
It might be possible to comprehend extravagant 
expenditures on roads which are never used, and 
buildings which, however imposing , fail utterly and 
completely to give one atom of evidence that their 
contents will simplify the acquisition of knowledge 
by the people. 
It is flattering, no doubt, to photograph and 
print such imposing piles, and give the architect’s 
estimate of their uses and their convertibility. It 
would be infinitely more useful to criticise them 
severely, and point out the wastefulness and ab- 
surdity of the proposed convertibility, and show 
that better and more instructive results could be 
more economically obtained without it. 
There is a duty of the Press towards such 
politicians as deserve shaking, and it savors of 
cowardice to avoid the issue. Vindex. 
The Power of Example. 
All over this vast country of ours the desire to 
improve the “Cities of the Dead’’ is manifest. The 
leaven introduced by the American Association of 
Cemetery Superintendents a few years ago is pro- 
ducing wonderful results. It would be difficult, in- 
deed, to visit a burial ground, even in the smallest 
community, where there is not a desire for improve- 
ment over the old order of things. 
Many of our Catholic cemeteries, too long neg- 
lected, are now, thanks to the efforts of Messrs. 
Brazill, Reid, Judson, Smyth and others, forging 
ahead, and can be ranked among the most beautiful 
in the land. 
The force of example, whether for good or evil, 
is soon apparent, and many are the instances of the 
influence from having one well conducted cemetery 
in a locality, that occur to the writer. 
The man in charge of a village burial ground on 
being asked how his place was conducted, proudly 
replied: “Upon the lawn plan. You must bear in 
mind that we have Spring Grove as our model.” 
A short time ago the trustees of our old fash- 
ioned burial place awoke to the fact that their 
grounds were behind the times, and an “up-to-date 
man’’ was engaged to remodel the old and con- 
struct an addition. This, of course, was received 
with a lot of opposition by several of the conserva- 
tive residents of the city, who prophesied all man- 
ner of dire things, and loud were the protests at the 
innovations; but the good work proceeded, and now 
they are not a little proud of their cemetery, and 
it is to be expected, will take the flattery much 
unto themselves: that they alone did it. 
Before finishing the work of reconstruction the 
work was visited by the “Fathers” of several vil- 
lages in the neighborhood; advice was asked, and 
freely given, and now within a radius of twenty- 
five miles there is a decided improvement in the 
care of the various rural burial grounds. L. B. 
SHADE TREES FOR A NARROW BORDER. 
As the following information will be of general 
interest and value where similar conditions exist, it 
may be explained that it is given in reply to a re- 
quest as to what trees would be best adapted for 
shade to be planted in a border 18 inches wide 
along a main walk of a cemetery in the locality of 
Philadelphia, the trees to be of dwarf habit and 
compact root growth: 
There are four trees which suggest themselves 
as suitable for this purpose, viz: Magnolia tripetela, 
Tilia argentea, Norway maple and the Western Ash- 
leaved maple. Any one of these would do. The 
Magnolia would be pleasing, because of its tropical 
looking foliage and its beautiful pink pods in the 
fall. 
Tilia argentea is the silver leaved linden. The 
Western ash-leaved maple is quite a different tree 
from the eastern one. It is more tree-like, and not 
so spreading, its growth being uniform. 
The Gingkhotree, Salisburia, would also answer 
if topped a little for a year or two. Left to itself 
it becomes a tall tree, but topping it sends out the 
side branches, making of it a beautiful tree. There 
is springing up a too long delayed demand for this 
tree. It has been used to a great extent at Wash- 
ington, where on wide avenues it is very effective. 
