PARK AND CEMETERY. 
303 
LANDSCAPE GARDENING IN THE MIDDLE WEST 
Judging from the gradual development 
of the pioneer on the Western plains from 
poverty to wealth and culture, the art of 
gardening has been the last of the fine arts 
to attract man. Like unto the immigrant 
himself, the arts are coming from the 
East, bringing with them thoughts and 
ideas of other lands, which though often 
unfitted climatically and otherwise to their 
new environs, may in spirit be woven into 
the American landscape. It is obvious that 
a perfect knowledge of climatic conditions 
as well as soil temperature is essential to 
the successful planning of landscape work. 
One often hears sympathy expressed for 
the prairie people of the West because they 
cannot enjoy some of the plants so en- 
joyable to the folks of the Atlantic coast. 
But no one need have any apprehension 
for our gardens. We may not be able to 
import from other countries coveted plants 
of distinctive beauty and charm, favored 
by climatic conditions which we cannot 
produce on the plains, but we are thereby 
all the more fortunate perhaps in that 
landscape artists, to develop the parks and 
gardens of the prairies, must preserve their 
individuality, incorporating many good 
things which our prairies have to offer 
that are as interesting and as charming as 
the plants that are foreign grown. 
Who will question the beauty of the 
crabapple? I dare say that if our streets 
were lined with crabapples, as the streets 
of Japan are lined with cherry trees, the 
prairie towns would become as famous 
during the month of May as the cities of 
Japan are today. There is nothing more 
beautiful than the native hawthorns, re- 
flecting, as it were, the horizontal lines of 
the prairie in their stratified branches. 
Look at the bluffs in early May along the 
Illinois River, when the red bud, like the 
strong brush of the painter, has thrown a 
dash of deep rose over them and down in 
the river bottoms, the native plum, garbed 
in the most delicate dress of pure white, is 
awaiting the festival of Spring. Who does 
not love the sumach, with its poetic foli- 
age, or the sheepberry, dogwood and nu- 
merous other plants that are invaluable to 
our gardens with their flowers and foliage? 
Is there anything more stately than the 
hard maple or elm, any more poetic than 
the birch? We have trees for low-land 
landscapes and trees for the hills. We 
have the white pine, the most stately of all 
the pines, and we have the cedars, the 
most mystifying and sacred of all the 
evergreens ; and when it comes to flowers, 
those of us who know the prairies and 
have seen them ablaze with phlox, girar- 
dias, painted cup, shooting star, golden- 
rod, aster and sunflowers, can we ever 
forget this grandeur of acres covered 
with these flowers ! Or take the river or 
brook edged with flag, loose strife, marsh- 
mallows, cattail, grasses, rushes; is there 
anything more beautiful? Of course, these 
plants fit the soil and are a part of the na- 
tive prairie landscape. For our gardens, 
is there anything more appropriate or more 
beautiful than the plants I have just men- 
tioned? And there are many others just 
as interesting and beautiful for our land- 
scape composition. 
Then, too, when the number of varieties 
is inadequate, there is always splendid op- 
portunity for the nurseryman and the gar- 
dener to develop new varieties from the 
native prairie plants. I can assure you 
that there will be sufficient varieties, even 
for the most critical and extravagant 
mind, and a broad field for the creative 
gardener. Let us consider, for a moment, 
the formal and informal gardens, both of 
which have their place. The informal gar- 
den, the garden of intimacy and feeling, of 
mysticism, the garden of democracy and 
friendship, the garden of air and free- 
dom, with no restraint and no formality, 
just like the prairie folks themselves, is 
the garden of poetry, of music and of lux- 
uriance. It is the embodiment of health, 
beauty and harmony. It harbors the mys- 
ticism of Ibsen and vibrates with the com- 
position of Wagner or Beethoven. It pro- 
duces the best setting for outdoor play 
and recreation and quiet delight ; it unites 
the charm of youth with the peaceful bene- 
diction and melody of declining life. The 
garden should not be a show place, a 
stilted exhibition of flowers, fountains, 
trees, shrubs, statuary, or anything else 
that might be introduced, but it should be a 
place of play, of quiet, a place to meditate, 
to be with one’s friends, and to commune 
with one’s self and with Nature. It is a 
sacred place, where the outdoors may be 
enjoyed to the fullest measure, thrilled 
with the song of birds, vibrant with the in- 
spiration of noble impressions, and com- 
J. J. Levison, secretary of the American 
Association of Park Superintendents, re- 
cently made an inspection of the trees of 
Syracuse, N. Y., and delivered a lecture on 
“Tree Problems of Syracuse’’ before the 
New York State College of Forestry in 
that city. Mr. Levison declared that evi- 
dently a great deal of fake tree doctoring 
has been done in Syracuse. He condemned 
the practice of filling cavities with cement, 
except under certain conditions. He con- 
tinued: “Only where a cavity is small and - 
so situated that there is no possibility of 
moisture to lodge in it, and if the disease 
can be absolutely eliminated by chisel and 
gouge, it may be advisable to use cement. 
Where a cover of tin or filling of cement 
municative of high and worthy things ; 
like unto grand opera contrasted with vau- 
deville; not a mere exhibition of wealth, 
not a garden of panoramic view, but a 
place of secluded spots, of subtle beauty 
and charm. The average formal garden 
expresses wealth and artificial life, the su- 
perficial only ; replete in its lack of the 
real, genuine, exquisite purpose of the in- 
formal garden. During the winter months 
it expresses desolation and death, while 
to the informal garden the fantastic charm 
of winter but adds' a different form of 
beauty. The formal garden has been ac- 
credited with being a society garden, “so- 
ciety” itself being formal ; but “society” is 
only human, and life out of doors is unre- 
strained, whether enjoyed by the poor or 
the rich, and additional wealth should only 
be a means of producing the most in- 
formal, the most charming, the most in- 
spiring of gardens ! The great love of the 
American people for out-of-doors w ill 
eventually tend toward a desire for com- 
plete informality in their gardens. They 
will demand something that does not be- 
come tiresome and monotonous, something 
that has new secrets and new beauty to 
unfold and reveal when Spring returns 
each year with renewed life and warmth. 
In their approaching informality, the gar- 
dens of the future will be free like the 
plains. The prairie itself is broken, as are 
the stratified cliffs of the prairie river and 
the stratified clouds of the horizon. The 
prairie, flat as it may seem, is relieved 
from monotony because it is rolling. Life, 
like the prairie river, flows along a wind- 
ing way, beautiful in its variety, constant 
in its ever-changing presentation of new 
scenes, new hopes, and some renewed and 
worthy purpose. We should profit by the 
great lesson of the informal garden, the 
free and rolling prairie, and the prairie 
river, peaceful and sublime ! 
Chicago. Jens Jensen. 
has been placed, without eliminating the 
microscopical fibers of disease, the situation 
is bound to be worse than had no covering 
or filling been done.” Generally, Mr. Levi- 
son said, the trees in Syracuse parks are 
in good condition, and the Park Commis- 
sion deserves praise for the care they have 
received. Then he added : 
“In spite of the criticisms I have made, 
Syracuse has a good supply of trees and 
they are well worth caring for. Of course, 
there is a great opportunity for planting. 
I was surprised that there are school 
grounds here in which no trees have been 
set out.” Syracuse ought to have a munic- 
ipal nursery for the production of seed- 
lings, in the opinion of Mr. Levison. 
TREE PROBLEMS OF SYRACUSE 
