PARK AND CE/HCTCRY 
25 
Mowing should be done at least once a week in 
favorable growing weather, and even in dry, warm 
weather it should be cut twice a month. If the 
lawn has been properly made in the first place, and 
top dressed, the weather will have to be very dry to 
prevent its growth. The best mode of maintaining 
is the care given at proper times. In the fall it is 
necessary to give a good scarrifying; this is done 
with a sharp toothed rake made for that purpose. 
The operation is called cultivating. If the grass 
shows thin in some places, another light sowing 
should be made, then cover with tobacco stems if 
the space is not very extensive, or give a coat of 
Kainit. This should be applied in December. The 
scarrifying process may be done again in the spring, 
but not very heavy, merely enough to give a good 
combing all over. If top dressing can be done, 
good rotted manure may be used, allowing it to lie 
from March to May, and then raked off with a 
coarse rake. 
Weeds are offensive and unsightly; cutting out 
of the large ones is sufficient, as the smaller ones 
are choked out by constant mowing. The means 
of perpetuating and caring for a lawn is open for 
improvement, also varies in different localities. 
Where fertilizers containing pure bone in majority 
can be secured at small expense it is advisable to 
use, and avoid manure from the stable because of 
its weed producing. 
Mr. John G. Barker, Supt. Forest Hills Ceme- 
tery, Boston, gives the following in Gardening’. 
Topdressing the Lawn. — We do not use sta- 
ble or farm yard manure for this purpose for two 
reasons, first because it is unsightly, secondly, be- 
cause it certainly introduces the seeds of weeds, 
and this we wish to avoid On a smooth lawn that 
needs enriching we use commercial fertilizer, 600 or 
700 pounds to the acre, with exceedingly satisfact- 
ory results, using an Acme Fertilizer distributer, 
which can be readily adjusted to spread any re- 
quired amount, of course the dressing may also be 
sown from the hand. [Mr. Barker doesn’t mention 
what brand he uses, but we know he uses both the 
Bradley and the Bowker lawn dressing.— Ed.] I 
shall topdress our lawns now just as soon as the 
frost is out of the ground enough to let the work- 
men walk on the grass without leaving the impress 
of their feet. The spring rains will wash the nutri- 
ment into the soil. After topdressing we roll the 
lawns to make them smooth for the mowing machine. 
Unleaciied wood ashes. — I use this as a top- 
dressing with good results, especially where moss 
and chickweed grow among the grass. A good 
dressing two years in succession will very material- 
ly lesson if not eradicate both of these pests and 
give a good sole of grass. 
Public Parks and Pleasure Grounds. 
It is a simple matter to form public pleasure 
grounds if they be entrusted to the right kind of 
men, and are carried out on common sense prin- 
ciples. 
The selection of the ground is the first thing, 
and here I would say that very much better might 
often be done for the people. A suburban farm 
may often be bought, levelled, ploughed, sown and 
planted, for a less sum than some commissioners 
spend in preliminaries. Farms, too, that are sure 
to be soon reached by the electric cars. 
Every community, however, will vary in its 
needs; for instance, towns having large Schools may 
reasonably demand educational features in their 
park planting. It is entirely feasible to select farms 
which embrace a stretch of native woodland, well 
adapted to pleasure ground purposes, where people 
may go where they will and do as they please, with- 
in orderly limits, and containing also cultivated 
tracts suitable for the planting of a classified collect- 
ion of trees and shrubs in agreement with modern 
science and Gray’s Botanies — constituting arborete- 
ums, or with herbaceous plants added — constituting 
botanic gardens. These must be fenced and pro- 
tected. Large cities with populations confined 
during the day to mercantile and manufacturing 
pursuits, will naturally demand streets adapted to 
pleasure driving, and a larger and more comprehen- 
sive variety of public grounds, perhaps embracing 
all of the varieties I have mentioned above. Where 
there is abundant wealth, public conservatories may 
be added and large sums of money spent in these 
and other less useful architectural features. It is 
not productive of the best results, however, to lav- 
ish money on immense barns of conservatories such 
as the World’s Fair arrangement. Such buildings 
can rarely be furnished or maintained properly — no 
matter how extravagant they are in first cost. It 
is far better to be content with a small conserva- 
tory, and provide liberally for a number of struct- 
ures such as commercial florists use, in which to 
grow a succession of plants to furnish it, and pro- 
duce a flower show for every season of the year. 
Such is the true economy both in first cost, subse- 
quent management and satisfactory results. If any 
of you have visited Kew Gardens you will remem- 
ber that the flower houses are not very large or ex- 
pensive, but they are full of flowers all the year 
through because they have a nursery of glass to 
supply them every week with a fresh lot of plants, 
therefore the show house keeps as gay as a florist’s 
window, but with a far greater variety. I may men- 
tion that these gardens attracted i,733>389 visitors 
in 1893, that they cost about $125,000 per year for 
maintenance, that they prepare hundreds of men 
