PARK AND CEMETERY. 
13 
not so much a question of expense to improve a 
vacant place, as one of time and energy. All the 
prominent landscape architects advise the use of 
local material for planting out purposes. What is 
needed most is intelligence in selection and ar- 
rangement, and if this is lacking, which in most 
cases it probably is, a moderate fee will secure a 
plan of improvement in the small town or 
village which will be the best paying investment, 
in more senses than one, that the community ever 
made. 
The cemetery is another point deserving of a 
■^hare of the interest and energy of x^rbor Day. 
The deplorable appearance of the majority of 
country cemeteries is a serious reflection on the 
people concerned. xAnd in connection with the 
cemetery, an excellent idea to be entertained and 
encouraged is the planting of memorial trees. x\ 
tree is always an appropriate memorial — a memorial 
that carries within itself a wealth of association, 
and whose characteristics are peculiarly fitting to 
adorn the last resting place of man and carry 
memory along with its growth. But where also is 
the country cemetery that would not be benefited 
by some properly placed shrubbery? Our native 
shrubbery is so rich in effect, and so varied in kind, 
that pictures for all seasons of the year can readily 
be arranged under intelligent direction. But apart 
from memorial trees, shade trees of permanent and 
suitable varieties should be more freely used in our 
rural burial places, they not only add to the value 
and beauty of the cemetery itself, but they will im- 
prove the general landscape, and by association, 
the community. 
In connection with memorial tree planting, and 
in fact with tree planting generally, a feature of 
great importance and educational value is the pro- 
vision of a permanent descriptive label, or other 
method of giving information concerning the tree. 
It is only telling half the story to describe the oc- 
casion and object of the tree and its planting; its 
own name and other particulars should be added, 
so as to make the matter complete. 
But we can come nearer home with the influence 
of Arbor Day if we will. Our own dooryards, 
as the home lots are sometimes called, afford oppor- 
tunities, the adornment of which would transform 
the appearance of nearly every town in the country. 
Aside from the effects of Arbor Day there are 
other influences at work in this direction. In a few 
of the large manufacturing districts of the civilized 
world, some enterprising corporations, finding it 
mutually advantageous to improve the home sur- 
roundings of its artisans, have encouraged, by ex- 
ample, practice and more solid inducements, aided 
by the advice of expert landscape gardeners, plans 
for improvement about the house lots that have 
had astonishing effects, not alone in the immediate 
vicinity, but with the community at large. 
There is not a village in the country that would 
not be materially advanced in many ways, by a 
determined effort to induce residents to plant out 
and care for their home lots. As was said before, 
the expense need be but small, the material may 
be found, in all probability, in the neighborhood, 
and a small outlay for a few annual seeds and other 
necessaries, would, in the results obtained, afford 
endless gratification, and encourage a love of home 
from an external standpoint. 
Considering all the channels by which such 
missionary work could be accomplished in our 
smaller places, none appears quite so appropriate 
for the work as the “Woman’s Club.” The use- 
fulness of such organizations beyond the work of 
self-culture, would find an absolutely permanent 
record in the lines herein suggested: Shade trees 
for the streets and public places: Improvements in 
the parks and cemeteries, where no regularly ap- 
pointed officials controlled their care: The promo- 
tion and active participation in the improvement of 
home surroundings. Here is a programme of 
sufficient expansiveness to meet the most ardent 
reformer, one that will not only promote the wel- 
fare, moral and physical, of the community, but 
will also offer a recompense in the pleasure enjoyed 
in prosecuting the work, and its after results more 
satisfying than any perhaps we poor mortals enjoy, 
because we have had good old mother nature for a 
partner. 
In an address on Arbor Day by Mrs. Cora C. 
Jones, of Boston, delivered before the Women’s 
Clubs of Massachusetts, not long ago, among other 
points made the following will be of interest: 
“What are the possibilities for Womens’ Clubs as Arbor 
Day history is yet to be written. What greater service can 
Womens’ Clubs do to first inform themselves on the subject of 
forestry, and seek to impress the present generation with the 
imperative need of tree planting and tree preservation. It 
would be a most worthy ambition to infuse into onr school sys- 
tem, reaching as it does the life and heart of every child, the 
purpose and the will to exert every effort to change this de- 
structive process to one of increase, in every state and territory, 
and teach those habits of thought and feeling in regard to the 
benefits and uses of tree planting, to deter them from the 
destruction of our lawns and parks. 
“We can encourage the organization of forestry associations 
in every city, town and school district. As part of our educa- 
tional program, we can plan attractive Arbor Day exercises, and 
interest the teachers in our vicinity to use them. * » * 
Every graduating class should hear a few practical lectures on 
forestry. Use less and waste less should be taught in the 
primary schools, for, as the Germans say, “What j'ou would 
have appear in the national life, you mu.st introduce in the 
Public Schools.” * *■ Lessons in the care of camp 
fires will decrease the horrors of forest fires. Plant trees in our 
door yards and our streets will soon he bordered. Lead a few 
horses awa}' from trees being gnawed to their death and wire 
guards will follow. 
“I believe the easiest way to solve great problems is to 
begin with individual effort. Try, however simply, to right 
the wrong, and growth will follow.” 
