Editorial J^iote 
American Park and Outdoor Art Association . 
The preliminary announcement of the seventh an- 
nual meeting of the American Park and Outdoor Art 
Association has just been issued. This year the con- 
vention will be held at Buffalo, N. Y., on July 7-9, and 
one day will be spent on the beautiful park reserva- 
tions about Niagara Falls, which will also include ex- 
cursions in the neighborhood. Features in the pro- 
gram demanding attention are : There will be no 
parallel sessions, so that no valuable papers or dis- 
cussions need be missed by anybody attending the 
convention ; special emphasis will be given to the work 
of the association itself ; school garden interests will 
be recognized by a special session ; park interests will 
be liberally met, and the auxiliary will be specially 
considered and cared for as it deserves. The interest 
taken in the forthcoming meeting by both the citizens 
and park commissioners of Buffalo will render the oc- 
casion one of great pleasure and value at a very mini- 
mum of expense, and in view of the advantages as to 
time and location, and the opportunities that will be 
afforded both to study and help in the great cause of 
outdoor art, members are earnestly invited to make 
special efforts to attend. 
^ ^ ^ 
To Improve the Country Roads . 
The Missouri legislature recently passed a bill 
which besides being of specific importance is highly 
suggestive. The bill is termed the ‘‘beautify the city” 
bill, and it gives the county courts of Buchanan and 
Jackson counties the privilege of setting aside a strip 
of land not less than six feet in width along and from 
each side of every public road of fifty feet or more in 
width, now or hereafter laid out as a public road, 
within a distance of two miles of the corporate limits 
of such city, for the purpose of having planted or 
cared for shade and ornamental trees and providing 
for and maintaining footpaths. Comment on this 
will not be necessary ; it deserves high commendation 
as an entering wedge to help in the improvement of 
the surroundings of our cities, towns and villages, and 
a scheme of practical education for the country people. 
^ ^ ^ 
Architects ana the Landscape Gardener. 
In the prosecution of civic betterment, there is one 
pressing question that must be settled, or the results 
will not meet the public expectation. It is that of har- 
mony between all the active forces engaged in the 
work. This is the general proposition and it is so in- 
volved in the progressive development of art out of 
doors that, perhaps the most important feature of the 
educational problem now being solved is to secure such 
harmony. A dissonant chord has already been struck 
and Comment. 
in one of our largest cities, now prominent in the 
movement, in the relation between residence and 
grounds, whereon the architects of the building come 
into conflict with the architects of the grounds. One 
of the most alluring attractions of the city of the 
future will be its residence thoroughfares, and it is 
quite certain that it will require more than mere archi- 
tectural design of the residences to create this effect. 
One need only to imagine a wide and otherwise useful 
avenue bordered on either side with handsome resi- 
dence structures, but standing amid crude and inhar- 
monious surroundings, to realize that notwithstanding 
the costly buildings, the picture, rather than attractive, 
would be repellant. An up-to-date residence thor- 
oughfare today demands the attention of the brother 
architect, the landscape gardener, and the allied pro- 
fessions must work hand in hand to secure results 
satisfactory to the ideals of modern refinement. Resi- 
dence grounds have been up to the present a 
neglected feature of the home, not only by owners, but 
more surprisingly still, by the architects themselves, 
an astonishing evidence of a blind conservatism, for 
as we look at the matter today the mind does not ac- 
cept the house alone as a complete satisfaction, but in- 
cludes the surroundings, the art out of doors, as an 
important factor in the architectural design as a whole. 
A scheme should be devised by our municipal and im- 
provement leagues to bring residence and landscape 
architects into harmonious relations wherever the two 
professions meet, with the object of promoting the 
most healthy progress toward securing ideals in civic 
improvement in the early future. 
^ ^ ^ 
Municipal Art Commission' s Decision. 
The decision of the Municipal Art Commission of 
Chicago to reject the model for an equestrian statue 
of Kosciusko which the Polish citizens of Chicago pro- 
posed to erect in Humboldt Park, is a sore disappoint- 
ment to the people interested. But it is a much-needed 
lesson and will surely result in good. The custom, 
hitherto prevailing, of allowing anything in the form 
of a monument to be erected in public places, to satisfy 
political or sectional demand, has loaded many of our 
cities with specimens of so-called monumental art 
which dishonor American taste and enlightenment. A 
common mistake of our foreign-born citizens and their 
immediate descendants is to carry their old-country 
prejudices beyond the limits of common sense as inter- 
preted bv their changed conditions. Thus, in the case 
of a proposition to erect a memorial to a distinguished 
old-country personage of their former nationality being 
accepted, the idea seems to prevail that a sculptor of 
that nationality must be secured to carry out the pro- 
