CHAPTER VI 
MUNICIPAL PARKS 
Let cities , kirks , and everie noble tovune 
Be purified, and decked up and downe . 
—-Alexander Hume ( 1557-1609). 
ONDON is almost completely sur¬ 
rounded by a chain of parks. 
Luckily, as the town grew, the 
necessity for fresh air began to be 
realised, and before it was too late, 
in the thickly-populated districts 
north, south, east, and west, any 
available open space has been con¬ 
verted into a public garden, or into a more ambitious 
park. Would that this laudable spirit had moved people 
sooner, and then there might have been a Finsbury Park 
nearer Finsbury, and the circle of green patches on the 
map might have been more evenly dotted about some of 
the intervening parishes. Many of the open spaces are 
heaths, or commons, or Lammas Lands, which have 
various rights attached to them, and, in consequence, 
have been saved from the encroachments which have 
threatened them from time to time, and have thus been 
preserved, in spite of the growth of the surrounding 
districts. Of late years the rights have in many instances 
been acquired by public bodies, so as to keep for ever 
these priceless boons. It was not until the middle of 
