382 
PARK AND CEMETERY 
cemetery crudities, including monuments, epitaphs and 
temporary memorial decorations. If the lot owner 
could be led to think along the lines suggested in the 
above, reform in every cemetery would be the order of 
the day ; and he could be influenced if the literature 
on the subject were presented to hfm under proper con- 
ditions and of proper quality. Every cemetery organi- 
zation should consider it not only a duty, but a busi- 
ness policy to place before its lot owners such literature, 
and in such volume as is possible, as will serve to en- 
lighten them in regard to the methods adopted in the 
best kept cemeteries of today. Many cemetery corpo- 
rations, of course, issue annual reports in which rules 
and regulations, and some illustrations of principal 
monuments and special features are shown, but in 
many instances the very things are presented that the 
modern cemetery is endeavoring to overcome. Neatly 
illustrated booklets containing suggestions to lot own- 
ers, based on the best modern practice, would be of 
great educational value. It is true that lot owners too 
often think of nothing but their own gratification in 
the care of their lots, and when this is objected to in 
the general interest, they will go elsewhere to purchase. 
It therefore follows that the line of education to be 
impressed is that, according to up-to-date ideas, the 
cemetery must be considered and treated as a whole ; 
each lot properly treated improves its neighbor and so 
on, and as soon as this is realized, dividing lines will 
disappear, monuments and markers will be selected 
with discretion and in strict accord with the rules and 
regulations formulated to make and keep the cemetery 
The time has come when so far 
as park statuary is concerned the 
old saying that “one must not 
look a gift horse in the mouth” must be disregarded. 
It is a fact that, as a rule, the statues that adorn our 
parks have been gifts of public spirited citizens or as- 
sociations, and in consequence the questions of art 
value and appropriateness have not been given that 
due consideration so important and necessary in public 
statuary. This has resulted in a very “bearish” feeling 
towards our park statues, and would be unhesitatingly 
condemned despite the motives and energy which in- 
spired their installation. In accepting or devising 
monuments or sculpture for public places it is abso- 
^lutely necessary ihat the future be considered, and 
whatever is placed, it must be a work of art, which 
although it may not hold its place in comparison with 
the art of the next generation, must be representative 
of the highest art of the day of its erection. Other- 
wise it becomes an object of ridicule and an evidence 
of the bad taste of its day and generation. Chicago, 
for instance, among a large number of specimens, has 
one great park monument, that of St. Gaudens’ Lin- 
beautiful. 
STATUARY 
IN 
OUR PARKS. 
coin, in Lincoln Park, and where is another in that 
city of which as much can be said? This naturally sets 
the standard, and municipal pride should see to it that 
in the future it shall be maintained. This condition 
rules in many of our large cities and creates a depar- 
ture for all future monumental work. 
THE If it needed any further evi- 
BILLBOARD dence that the “trust” and “com- 
CAMPAIGN. bine” question demand the imme- 
diate attention of Congress, the methods of the bill- 
board advertising concerns, which appear to have a 
national organization, furnish it. The Buffalo cam- 
paign against the nuisance, the new ordinances for con- 
trolling which have been recognized as valid by the 
highest courts of the state, recently met with a set- 
back in the shape of injunction proceedings in the 
United States Court to restrain the city from acting 
under the provisions of the ordinance governing bill- 
board advertising. It appears that in order to do this 
the billposters’ association secured incorporation in 
some other state, thus becoming a foreign corporation 
and under the jurisdiction of the federal courts. This 
phase of the billboard nuisance broadens the whole 
question and adds to the national importance of the war 
against its abuses. The rapid extension of the electric 
trolley system, the facility of travel generally, the great 
advances in park making and the wonderful natural 
beauty of much of our landscape areas in many states, 
have tended to promote outdoor life and excursion 
travel, facts which have not escaped the attention of 
the billboard and public advertising concerns. These 
have not only increased their facilities to cover the 
broader fields constantly opening up, but have carefully 
laid their plans to oppose by every means possible the 
efforts of municipal and other officials to curb their 
outrageous abuses of public right, to say nothing of 
common sense and decency. So flagrant have been 
their efforts to secure points of vantage for billboard 
display, that in Massachusetts, especially, a very strong 
current of feeling is being aroused, for much of the 
choicest scenery in the state is being marred and de- 
graded by advertising billboards, and the efforts in 
park making and the improvement of forest reserves 
are being made ridiculous by obnoxious advertising. 
The crusade against the billboard is increasingly active 
in Chicago, St. Louis and other prominent cities and 
a means will certainly be found to regulate the business 
to the full intent of public demand. The Prussian 
legislature has recently passed a law to prevent the dis- 
figpirement of places remarkable for their natural 
beauty which authorizes the police to abolish any ad- 
vertising boards or devices that disfigure the landscape, 
and local authorities have been instructed to see that 
the law is enforced. Why cannot we follow this good 
example in every state of the Union? 
