Soon after you spoke to me last summer about the choice of a place for the statue of General Devens, I wrote you comprehensively and at some length on the subject of sites for statues and monuments in a city. I was in the mountain region of North Carolina when I completed this letter, and sent it out under cover, as I suppose, to our office in Brookline. In some way it miscarried, and I shall now aim to repeat the substance of it.

When a body of citizens have contributed the funds necessary to obtain a statue of anyone whom they wish to honor, and offer the statue as a gift to a Park Commission, a refusal of it is difficult on any grounds. It sometimes happens that before a statue is so presented, those who offer it have already selected a place for it, and, again, a refusal of this place may be difficult. If the commissioners yield to the wishes of the applicants, as in most cases they are disposed to do, it may happen that a place is given to a statue, which, if the interests of the public in the primary object of the park as a body of rural scenery had been fairly considered, would not have been thought of for it.

At a certain period in the history of the Central Park of New York the danger began to be apparent to some that, in time, its principal originating purpose would be largely sacrificed to the purpose of a gallery of sculpture. Rurality would appear only in the backgrounds, and the foregrounds would be in discord with the backgrounds. The proposal at one time seriously entertained of setting up a statue of Tweed in the Park, led to graver consideration of the general question than it had before obtained, and helped to foster a healthier public sentiment on the subject. Serving for a short time after the downfall of Tweed as President of the Department, I succeeded in convincing two committees offering statues that had been paid for by subscriptions of citizens, and who had been asked to consult me, that their purpose would be better accomplished by placing these statues elsewhere than in the Park. Since then the conviction has become common that, with regard to the object of keeping fresh in the mind of the people the memory of a man who has well served his country, these statues are better placed than they would have been in the Park. Accordingly the statues of Farragut, of Seward, of Lafayette and others are now daily seen by much larger numbers of people than see those that are in the Park, and the danger that the Park will come to better serve the purpose of a Pantheon than of a rural retreat has been arrested. The comments that have been made publicly on the only portrait statue that has since been set up in the Park have not favored a return to the old practice. In Brooklyn, also, sites [895]for two statues, originally intended to be set up in Prospect Park, have been found elsewhere, one being before the City Hall.

I have thus, perhaps, sufficiently indicated my reason for not thinking it desirable to place a statue of General Devens in Franklin Park. I must add that when I have studied the question where it could be best placed in the Back Bay Fens, I have found no point there that I could be fully satisfied to recommend.

If portrait statues are to be placed in any rural park, I think that it would be better to associate them with the necessary architectural works of that park rather than with features of natural scenery; to place them in connection with a formal entrance gate to the Park, for example, rather than on the open space of one of its meadows.

I am further inclined to the opinion that no statue or monument should be so placed in a rural park that it would interfere with the rural character of the park, or that it would, by association of ideas, lead the mind from the restful, contemplative disposition to which pleasing natural scenery is apt to incline it.

To illustrate this view of the matter may I suggest that statues of Longfellow, Lowell and Holmes might well be placed in a passage of rural scenery, because the association of ideas which these would be most apt to suggest would accord with the sentiment of the scenery. Yet even in such a case, I do not think that the statues should be given highly prominent and conspicuous places. They should rather be in nooks and alcoves of foliage, and in this way, as much as possible blend with other elements of scenery predominatingly rural in character.

What was the most marked circumstance in the life of General Devens that should be had in view in choosing a place for his statue? Was it not that, having had his place in the affairs of his community as a lawyer, when war came, he withdrew from that place and took upon him the duty of a soldier? Where can this fact be best commemorated? Hardly, I think, in a place of rural seclusion. Might it not rather be at a point in which the statue would have some relation with the State House or the Court House, and would appropriately bear the motto “Inter arma silent leges”? Just where this point would be, I should not like to say without conference with the City Architect. But, as illustrating the principle for which I am contending I may observe that, considering that General Devens was a man of affairs, and that when war came he quickly discharged himself of those affairs in order to take the field as a soldier, I am disposed to think that the most significant position for his statue would be one in the heart of the town, near the Court House, or at the head of State Street, for example. If a position for the statue were practicable to be made at the east end of the Old Court House, looking upon State Street, without materially obstructing street traffic, I think it would be satisfactory.

It is obvious that having in view a ground especially for rural recreation in connection with the City, artificial adornments of it should not [896]dominate the scenery in the manner that, for example, the City Hall dominates the view towards it from School Street, or in which the State House dominates it from Beacon Street. In neither of these places is rural scenery practicable to be formed, but in both, decorations of trees and flowering plants have rightly been provided.

On an urban public ground buildings and artificial structures cannot be kept out of sight; they will necessarily be an important element of the local scenery. This being the case, a different standard of what is desirable must be used in laying out an urban public ground from that to be used in laying out a rural public ground. In an urban ground objects may be introduced, and even made conspicuous that would be discordant with the distinctive character of a rural ground. For example, where a building comes conspicuously into view, and at no great distance within the field of vision, a work of sculpture, even in the foreground, will not necessarily be discordant with a desirable general effect. On the contrary, wisely and not too profusely placed, works of sculpture may enhance a desirable general effect; they may even give desirable emphasis to the foreground of a passage of scenery of which buildings are the background.

A clear distinction is thus to be made between two classes of the public grounds of a town, and for the present purpose this distinction may be indicated by referring to grounds of one class as urban and to those of the other as rural. Hence the aims and principles of design applicable to small grounds in the interior of the town, are wholly different from those applicable to a larger ground on the outskirts of the town. Any attempt, for instance, to establish a pastoral character in a small ground, closely bordered by lofty town-like buildings, will certainly breed confusion of motive and be a failure. But a dignified and stately urban character in such a ground is perfectly satisfactory, and a statue well-placed in it upon a fitting architectural pedestal, may contribute greatly to gain it this character.

This letter had been so far written and was yet incomplete when I was informed that your Committee had already chosen a site for the statue of General Devens, fully in accordance with the views which I was intending to advocate. I was going on to suggest either of two urban sites that I had had under consideration last summer, but before completing the letter I had proposed to myself to have a conference with the City Architect on the subject and more especially with regard to the practicability of a site in which the statue might stand in some direct relation with the proposed new City Hall. I should have had such a conference long before this if I had not supposed that the project of the new City Hall was yet too nebulous to justify any distinct plan for placing the statue in connection with it. I am glad that it is not thought so, and do not question that the best site for the statue has been chosen.

I think it best to send you this letter now, mainly, that you may realize that I have not been so neglectful of the wish you expressed to me last summer as might otherwise appear.

Respectfully Yours