The Evolution of the Street — II. 
There is, 
too, the fur¬ 
ther advan¬ 
tage that by 
this system of 
planting in 
the middle, 
instead of at 
the curbs, it is 
possible to 
shade the 
street without 
shading the 
houses. Of 
course much 
width is need¬ 
ed to make the 
system prac¬ 
ticable, but its 
possible ad¬ 
vantage in healthful ness—through the greater 
sunshine that may come to the houses when 
the trees are not at the curb of a narrow 
walk—appears in comparing the bird’s-eye 
view of the Champs Elysees with the near 
view of the Boulevard de Strasbourg in 
Paris. The claim should be noted, how¬ 
ever, that a tree-planted street, even with the 
trees at the curb, is, as a general rule, con¬ 
sidered more healthy than one that is bare 
of trees. With this reflection we should 
not fail to notice that there has appeared in 
the development of the street a regard for 
its hygienic influence. 
The street that by degrees has broadened 
and grown, thus almost consciously, in beauty 
and splendor, 
insistently de¬ 
mands and 
cordially re¬ 
ceives a better 
care. Its pave¬ 
ment, which 
has been im¬ 
proving not 
less rapidly 
than other 
parts of the 
street, is swept 
and washed as 
though it were 
indeed a par¬ 
lor floor; and 
the street is 
lighted as bril- 
liantly, and 
finally as decoratively, as the conception of 
its function of public drawing-room would 
suggest. Into the cleaning there goes even 
more of hygienic impulse than of esthetic, 
and the lighting had its origin in a desire for 
protection. The now established principle 
that no policeman is as good as a light was 
early foreseen ; for in such prosaic but es¬ 
sential requirements, that the public health 
and public safety be not endangered on the 
way, began the cleaning and lighting of 
streets. If in these the esthetic desire has 
at last become dominant, it is through a slow 
course of evolution; and ever and again, 
when put to the test, there is a return to 
primary motives. 
THE PRADO AT MARSEILLES 
266 
