46 
PARK AND CEMETERY 
IMPROVEMENT ASSOCIATIONS 
CONDUCTED BY 
MRS. FRANCES COPLEY SEAVEY. 
- 
OUTDOOR ART WITH THE ART LEFT OUT. 
Organized improvement work is menaced by a se- 
rious and subtle danger which is the more insidious 
because it comes from within. It is the lack of appre- 
ciation as to what constitutes good planting and the 
consequent entirely logical failure to provide improve- 
ment organizations with information on this important 
point. In short, we seem to be in a fair way to have 
an enormous crop of outdoor art with the art left out. 
Indubitable evidence of this unfortunate condition 
art authorities would not approve and which, too fre- 
quently, is of a character that they would condemn as 
distinctly bad. It is certainly to be deplored that any 
who are devoting time and labor to the organization 
and instruction of these societies should fail to impress 
the importance of a thorough understanding of what 
constitutes good planting. There is no excuse for igno- 
rance on this point on the part of any improvement 
worker or teacher. Good literature on the subject is 
available, and the American Park and Outdoor Art 
Association practically exists for the purpose of train- 
ing its members in the knowledge and appreciation of 
landscape art. It costs only $2.00 a year to belong to 
this association. Those who are uninformed in this 
fundamental of improvement work would better not 
pose as teachers until prepared to do outdoor art and 
HERBACEOUS 
PERENNIALS. 
FUNKIAS IN THE 
FOREGROUND. 
PERMANENT BORDER 
OF HARDY 
PERENNIALS. 
is found in reports of the work of existing organiza- 
tions, and even in addresses made at meetings held for 
the express purpose of instructing communities and 
individuals in the formation of the new ones. These 
bad examples are insistent and prove that the need for 
immediate reform is urgent. 
This criticism is made in the most kindly spirit and 
solely to the end of helpfulness. It is small use to tell 
people to beautify their surroundings and then leave 
them in ignorance of what work is best worth doing ; 
but it is much worse to suggest planting that outdoor 
its followers greater justice. There is certainly some- 
thing radically wrong when those who undertake to 
teach and to organize suggest such improvements as 
a parkway down the middle of a village street, the 
greensward of which shall be dotted with variously 
shaped beds of tender material, foliage plants being 
particularly recommended. Such teachers may mean 
well, but they are not fitted to give instruc- 
tion on the subject under consideration, and are 
consequently misleading their hearers. It is a 
case of the blind leading the blind; and 
