Yours of yesterday recvd.

With regard to buildings the usual course is to take them under condemnation and afterwards sell at auction with the condition that they shall be removed before a date fixed. We should take care that what can be got in this way is available for improvemnts — as a discretionary fund to be used to eke out anything else that is short in construction, maintenance, or incidental expense accounts. I inquired about the Tugby building & was told that it was a balloon frame & could not be moved, but I think it can, by inserting a sill & strengthening the frame work. You might get Eaton’s opinion.

I have slept out a clear conviction upon a point as to which I must at times have appeared temporarily muddled. It is important to us to get as much as we can of the back part of Prospect Park and to form a distinct, capacious, well arranged ante-room to the American reserved ground. It is not desirable that this should be held as a picnic ground or a park or common by the village or by private owners. It will play a most important part in the scheme of managmnt and the larger the area that can be secured for it the better.

I wish now, before defining the boundary lines, that I could have a close topographical map of the American shore as far back as we can think of taking land & go at once to work upon a plan of laying it out — not an official work but precautionary — with a view to determining safely just what will prove to be important and the relative importance of every foot.

I am making up my mind that the military project must be fought at the outset & very warily, & that we must stand or fall upon cardinal principles which will exclude the idea & every other idea but that of the simplest enjoyment of natural scenery. People must not come to the reservation for any other purpose & must be even required to submit to some inconvenience and restraint (such as is not required in public “parks") for the sake of opportunity [423] for contemplativeness. It is a big problem. I feel as I get nearer to it and the liklihood of its becoming real increases that if not the most difficult problem in landscape architecture to do justice to, it is the most serious — the furthest above shop work, that — the world has yet had. All practicable room to work in should be secured.

Although we must look to separate administrations; the International idea must be kept prominent. We can resist the militia best by making it so and pointing to the impropriety of showing our arms, under the circumstances. I suppose that we can arrange that an admission on either side passes the admittee free on the other.