House and Garden 
4-’* 
~ mi 
T'lie Overlook from the Playstead. Contrast with the Refectory, 
architecture is such that it harmonizes perfectly with its 
natural and picturesque surroundings 
except in summer and then it is largely for games. 
In explanation many reasons may be given. One is 
unquestionably its inaccessibility It is more distant 
from the densely settled residence sections than is 
Fairmount Park in Philadelphia,. Central Park in 
New York, and the parks of othei|large cities in this 
country and Europe. 
Phis remote position 
no doubt lessens its 
present use and value. 
Mr. Olmsted’s re¬ 
ports and correspond¬ 
ence are explicit as 
to the fundamental 
purpose of h ranklin 
Park. “The prime 
ohject’’ he says, “will 
be to present favor¬ 
ably to public enjoy¬ 
ment a body of rural 
and sylvan scenery, 
large in scale, simple 
and tranquil in char¬ 
acter, and in contrast 
and as a foil to this, 
passages of a wild, 
rugged, picturesque 
and forest-like aspect. It is desirable that the larger 
part of the park should be of such character that it can 
easily be kept in good order and sustain its design with¬ 
out great expense, and that for this purpose it should 
have less of a garden-like and more of a distinctly 
park and forest-like character than is now generally 
attempted in American parks.” Again: “The only 
justihcation of the cost of a large park near a growing 
city is the necessity of spaciousness to the production 
of rural scenery.” Ibis clear recognition that 
attractive and consistent rural scenery is the essential 
end and purpose of 
a large park was 
new. Mr. Olmsted 
himself hrst pre¬ 
sented it. 'Po him, 
therefore, belongs the 
credit for an original, 
sound and far-reach¬ 
ing idea, an idea that 
he had to reiterate 
again and again and 
bravely defend. The 
one serious difficulty 
attached to this idea 
he also appreciated, 
as the following quo¬ 
tation shows: “I'here 
is simply the diffi¬ 
culty connected with 
it of reconciling the 
Its 
The Refectory—a huge structure of yellow brick and terra-cotta, con¬ 
spicuous beyond excuse, and altogetlier inharmonious 
with its environment 
necessary apparatus of public use with the 
requirement of consistency and harmony of expres¬ 
sion, and of making such apparatus sufficiently 
modest and unobtrusive.” 
As the provision of simple rural scenery, then, is the 
main object and controlling purpose of a “country 
park,” it is worth 
while to examine the 
ways in which such 
scenery gives pleas¬ 
ure. There are at 
least four ways: (i) 
T h e spontaneous, 
unreflecting happi- 
, ness that all unso¬ 
phisticated persons 
feel in free open-air 
life. This happiness 
is largely but not 
entirely physical. It 
was well expressed by 
Oliver Wendell 
Holmes in his speech 
at Faneuil Hall in 
1876 when public 
sentiment in Boston 
in favor of public 
parks was being aroused. He said: “We can and we 
must secure for our citizens the influences of unroofed 
and unwalled nature—air, light,space for exercise and 
recreation, the natural birthright of mankind.” 
(2) The satisfaction that comes from the correspond¬ 
ence (fancied or real) in Nature with our own moods, 
a correspondence that enables us to see all things in 
sympathy with our own feelings. In Coleridge’s 
Ode to Dejection we hnd this view of Nature con¬ 
densed into a single stanza. He says that in our 
contact with the outward world: 
“We receive but what we give; 
And in our life alone does Nature 
live. 
Ours is the wedding garment, 
ours the shroud.’’ 
(3) The pleasure we 
take in nature for 
herself, a keen satis¬ 
faction in her beauty 
and wonder as an 
objective thing, con¬ 
sidered quite apart 
from man. This is 
represented by the 
current phrase 
“nature for her own 
sake. ” (4) The joy 
obtained from enter¬ 
ing into the life and 
movement of nature 
6 
