I have just received, gratefully, your letter of the 17th instant. I feel with you warmly that the meeting at Chicago was a most happy, useful and promising occasion and I look forward with much pleasure to others to follow.

[295]

I am a most unfluent and clumsy writer and can publish nothing without an appalling amount of revision and trimming. I have always applications in this way beyond my ability to meet. I cannot now possibly undertake what you suggest that I should for the Atlantic.

The latest information I have of the class you need is in the form of a Report from the Earl of Meath to the New Town Government for London, called the County Council. Lord Meath was at my house while here and his Report is largely based on information compiled from various sources in our office, or which were collected for him by direct correspondence with the different cities. It is neither full nor accurate, and there are omissions in it of matter we gave him, for which I cannot account. Perhaps he thought it too vague or incomplete. For example, Denver possesses a public park site not yet much improved. I presume that you have correspondents there. If not, you could address the Mayor, or our friends Andrews and Jacques, who have an office there now, would get accurate information for you. A public park, parkway and small grounds are being laid out at Omaha by our friend, H.W.S. Cleveland, a most worthy old gentleman, formerly a partner of Copeland and of Follen in Boston, whom you could address, mentioning that I advised you, care of the Park Commission of Omaha. He would gladly aid you, I know.

There is an article of mine on “Parks” in the American Encyclopedia, and one on “Landscape Gardening” in Johnson’s Encyclopedia, that you might like to run over.

You will find some information in Waring’s contribution to the Census of 1880; “Social Statistics of Cities.” See columns “Parks” in the index of each of the two volumes (XVIII and XIX); but it will hardly pay for the gathering.

Hyatt’s interest in the subject has grown entirely out of efforts of mine to get the Boston Society of Natural History to move with reference to out-of-door scientific and educational museums. I will try to send you copies of correspondence on the subject. I mention the fact only that you may recognize that my prevailing purpose has been to guard against the injection of such museums into park designs.

This brings me to what would be chiefly interesting to me in anything that you may write on the subject of parks.

The grand difficulty with which, from the outset, Vaux and I had to contend, and with which all who have a serious interest in the subject are incessantly struggling, is the almost universal want of discrimination between the special purposes, motives and reasons for being, of different species of public grounds. From the beginning of work on Central Park, as you must in some degree recollect, the disposition of the public, of the liberally educated, cultivated men, of the majority of newly appointed Park Commissioners, of all snobs and Philistines like Judge Hilton, and of nearly all members of City Councils and other city officers, has been to consider land appropriated for a public park as a vacant space in which anything of public interest could be dumped that would not be better placed on land in the form of city lots to be [296]specially purchased for the purpose. Half the strength of my life has been spent in various forms of contention with this difficulty. I send you a copy of the last private letter I have written on the subject. This was in reply to an inquiry addressed to me a few weeks ago by Paul Dana almost immediately after his appointment as a Park Commissioner. During the last thirty years I have written many such letters, and also a great deal for the public on the subject, mostly through newspapers with reference to special occasions. I will send you one of these writings, of a less fugitive character than most, addressed to the Social Science Association in 1880. You will not need to read it all, but I wish you would glance at the first half dozen and the last three pages at least, in order to see for what I am always contending.

You may observe that Lord Meath quotes from this pamphlet a passage, the object of which was really the opposite of that he apparently assumes: i.e. the passage was intended as an introduction to an argument for large parks (preserves) of rural scenery, such as cannot be had in public grounds of small area. Doubtless, he accidentally missed the point, but the fact that he did so shows you how hard it is to get the less intelligent public, and less liberal Park Commissioners to apprehend the point.

(Lord Meath has officially to do with no large public park, but only with small public grounds. He is Chairman of an Association, the chief object of which is to get the disused burial grounds of London turned into gardens—not parks—and opened to the public,—a most useful institution.)

My notion is that whatever grounds a great city may need for other public purposes, for parades, for athletic sports, for fireworks, for museums of art or science, such as botanic gardens, it also needs a large ground scientifically and artistically prepared to provide such a poetic and tranquilizing influence on its people as comes through a pleased contemplation of natural scenery, especially sequestered and limitless natural scenery.

What should be aimed at in this respect is always a special problem to be solved by special study of the landscape capabilities of each city.

Please preserve and return to me the Meath Report and the pamphlet by Eckman. You need not return the others.

Suppose that you had been commissioned to build a really grand, opera house; that after the construction work had been nearly completed and your scheme of decoration fully designed, you should be instructed that the building was to be used on Sundays as a Baptist Tabernacle, and that a suitable place must be made for a huge organ, a pulpit and a dipping pool. Then at intervals afterwards, you should be advised that it must be so re-fitted and furnished that parts of it could be used for a court room, a jail, a concert hall, hotel, skating rink, for surgical cliniques, for a circus, dog show, drill room, ball room, railway station and shot tower? What chance would you see for making a fine affair, in any respect, of your building?

Again, suppose that once in three or four years an ordinary house [297]painter and paper hanger, or even a theatrical scene painter, should be called in to revamp and improve your decoration of the auditorium? Could you think of such a history without indignation and disgust?

But that, more or less, is what is nearly always going on with public parks. Pardon me if I overwhelm you; it is a matter of chronic anger with me.

Cordially Yours,

I am very sure, from past experience, that as soon as the plan for the Exposition as it now stands comes to be generally realized, there will be much pressure brought to bear to make use of the interior waters in many ways, for which plausible and taking reasons will not be wanting. I have given the question of what can be well done on the waters a good deal of thought and I wish to show you how the matter now stands in my mind, in order that you may guard against the unadvised entertainment of undesirable projects.

As the plan now stands, we allow a breadth of water at the bridges over the canal of 90 feet. It is probable that considerations of economy will compel us to reduce this a little. The bridges are expected to have a bow form, and probably near the abutments there will be insufficient head room for the passage of the boats. Let us assume a breadth of 60 feet for the available navigable water.

We should try to make the boating feature of the Exposition a gay and lively one in spectacular effect. I have no doubt that the use of the boats, if they are made as convenient and attractive as practicable, will be very great. We shall want to keep as many of them moving as we well can. The water will, in effect, be a street, at several points but 60 feet wide. The boats will have to be managed as vehicles in a street, but a boat cannot be managed as deftly as a horse and carriage and it cannot be guided as accurately. The safe course will be to allow no row boats upon the interior waters, nor any craft the guidance of which is to be with a man facing sternward. No paddle boats, no “swan boats,” no sailing boats nor any craft that cannot be turned and stopped very quickly and easily; none the appearance of which will not be graceful, ship-shape and stylish.

So much for what should be prevented in order not to crowd, embarrass or endanger such boating as it will be expedient to allow.

As to what should be allowed, I am seeking information from several sources, more especially as to actual experience in the use of electrically propelled boats, both in this country and abroad. I have written to London for this [301]and have consulted Mr. Burgess and others. What we shall want is a regular service of boats like that of an omnibus line in a city street. Our plan now provides for 16 landings, at each of which the passengers would go ashore and embark. Each of these landings would be as near as practicable to an entrance of one of the Exposition buildings and we should have as many boats running at regular intervals as we could have without the necessity of bringing two boats at a time to the same landing. The method would be very similar to that of the penny boats on the Thames. But, the water being narrower, and for other reasons, the boats should be comparatively small, perhaps 25 feet in length, and adapted to carry rather more than an ordinary omnibus load of passengers, say twenty at a time, with all seats filled. It is not desirable that they should be fast. A speed of not more than six miles an hour is all that I think should be required. The boats should be very nice boats, delicately decorated and altogether elegant in their appearance. It is desirable that they should have some original features designed especially for the occasion, and they should be altogether of such a character that, after one year’s use, they should be very salable, their attractiveness, convenience and handiness having been thoroughly well advertised during all of the Exposition. It is Mr. Burgess’s opinion and mine that they can be made a source of profit. They would probably pay their cost in fares during the year and in the end sell for nearly as much more. Mr. Burgess’s name as the designer of the boats would be worth a good deal in this respect.

I asked Mr. Burgess if he would be willing, upon a commission from the Directory, to build a sample boat suitable for the purpose and provide all her outfit. He replied, in effect, that he would do so with much interest and pleasure. The plan for such a boat having been prepared by Mr. Burgess, in conference with us, and approved by the Directory, the boat would be built under the supervision of Mr. Burgess and, after trial next Summer, and having been improved in any manner that trial should suggest to be desirable, would be the type and model in all respects of the entire fleet of omnibus boats for the Fair. Contracts would then be made with boat builders and manufacturers of electric plants for furnishing them equal in all respects to the model. The cost of such boats would, Mr. Burgess thought, be under a thousand dollars each, or less than the price of a good hackney coach carrying four.

I am advised from Washington the impression prevails with naval officers that, as yet, the most satisfactory motor for boats is steam, but this probably means for ships’ launches to be used for all manner of naval service in which boats can be employed. But I am still of the opinion, as is Mr. Burgess, that for a great deal of pleasure boating, electric engines would be satisfactory. This would be the case, for instance, on the small lakes of Central New York and Wisconsin. All the circumstances would be particularly favorable to the use of electricity on the Exposition waters. Probably storage batteries would be employed, and there would need to be a power house for charging them. But upon this point I wait advices from London.

Providing, as above suggested, for the actual necessities of water [302]transportation, I think there could be added, as a feature of interest, a small fleet of large birch bark canoes. These would be managed by Indians suitably trained, equipped and costumed for the purpose, (wearing deerskin shirts and moccasins with beading and feathers.) There would be little difficulty, I suppose, in arranging this in Canada. The canoes would add a feature of interest to all observers, and most Europeans coming to the Fair would be glad to have a trial of them and to pay liberally for it.

Small canoes, more especially of the type commonly used by our Canoe Clubs, of which there are now great numbers in the United States and Canada, might also be admitted to the waters. They would be very small, would have but one, or at most two, occupants; would be propelled by the paddle, the paddler looking forward. But this would not be safe, except with skilled canoemen. I should propose that no one be allowed to use the smaller canoes except members of the Canoeing Association. You know that this Association meets every year, when large numbers of very elegant canoes are brought.

I think the charge for a seat in the launches might be ten cents for the round trip under a system of collection similar to that used on the elevated railways in New York. For a seat in the bark canoes twenty-five cents would probably be charged.

Venetian gondolas, and any other curious and interesting boats to be propelled by sculling, not by rowing, would be admissible.

That is all I need say, at present, about the practical boat service of the interior waters of the Exposition, but I wish to add that it would seem to me most desirable to make a display of certain other marine features. Especially, to obtain from Spain a full-sized specimen of the kind of craft in which Columbus made his voyage. This would be, to all men interested in maritime affairs, an object of great curiosity, and although it is not probable that any clear account of the particular vessel in question can be obtained, I have very little doubt that a perfect representation of the type could be. I have not visited the headquarters of the navy department of Spain, but from what I have seen elsewhere, I should think it highly probable that pictures, if not models, of a caravel would be found there and a pretty good knowledge had of all the details of their fittings, rigging and equipment. Anything of that kind would be an object of great interest to many of us and an exhibition of it would illustrate the boldness and enterprise of the undertaking of Columbus in an admirable manner.

It would be very interesting also to secure an exhibition of various sorts of quaint, foreign water craft in contrast with our own. I mean such as Malay proas, catamarans, Arab {dhows}, Chinese sanpans, Japanese pilot boats, Turkish caiques, Esquimaux kiacks, Alaskan war canoes, the hooded boats of the Swiss Lakes, and so on. All these are small. They could be kept afloat near the big war ship, if desired, without being in the way of our omnibus boats, and all could be procured readily and at no very great cost.

Since writing the above, we have had two long interviews with Mr. Bogigion, who will see you early next week with reference to a scheme in [303]which we are very much interested, of a Persian display at the Exposition. Mr. Codman will write you about it. Mr. Bogigion’s plan, as it has been thus far developed to us, would include a waterside garden with a landing at which two types of Persian boats would be moored.

All I have written is, of course, tentative and wholly provisional. I should like to know that, so far as it goes, it would meet with your approval, and that you would think it practical to fend off anything interfering with it. Please advise with the Committee on Buildings and Grounds, and with General Davis, if you see occasion.

Yours Truly