National Republican., 1883-11-02
THE FALLING LEAVES.
Twenty-Five Hundred Cart Loads Litter the
Streets and Parks of Washington.
How They Are Collected and Disposed Of
Their Ability TO Resist Decay.

The sight of some billions of dead leaves
drifted into huge banks along tho streets, and
thickly covering the grass of the parks, play
things for the children and tho wind, suggests
that it must be a matter of some difficulty to
take care of them. A reporter of THE RE-
| PUBLICAN recently made inquiry as to what
became of this debris of summers shade
The street cleaners have much the greater
| part of them to care for, and for about FIVE
weeks in the fall of tho year they take ava
on an average fifty cart loads day--in all,
about 800 loads. Part of these are given
away to be used rs fertilizers, but most of
them are dumped on the dozen or more res =
ervation dumping grounds of the city. There
| is some difficulty in giving them away, as
| they are not worth much for fertilizing
| purposes for years after they fall
About 700 loads a year are taken from the
public grounds. There is more demand for
these because they arc clean, unmixcd with
street sweepings, and make good bedding for
horses. The commissioner of public grounds
manages to give away nearly half of this 700
| loads. Many loads are used for packing the
public fountains for the winter. The basins
of the fountains are first filed and ttcad
down, then the water gets among tho leav os
and they pack themselves still closer.
and then they are filed second
time. When taken out in the spring
these leaves look rs if they wero rotten
and would fall in pieces but they are tough
rs leather, and if put upon the land they
would soon dry out and blow away. 1t takes
years for them to thoroughly decay. After
they are taken from the fountains they are
piled in heaps along the river banks, and in
various other places and lime is sprinklod
| among them to mako them rot faster. Tho
| poplar and maple leaves decay quickest and
the oak leaves slowest, because they contain
the most fannie acid and are preserved by it.
| There are piles of leaves on the river bank
| which have been there for ton years and are
not yet thoroughly decayed. Even when
completely rotted, leaf compost is not valu-
able fertilizer, but it is used with tho best
| effect to Tighten heavy clay soil. 1t opens up
and mellows the clay, which would, without
| it, pack hard like stone.
The men who care for the public grounds
have to gather the leaves four or five times dur
| ing the autumn, because each kind of tree has q
different time to shed its leaves The
naples, of different kinds, throw off their
| leaves earliest, and the oak and beech leaves
cling the longest. Frequently the dead beech
leaves refuse to fall until they are pushed
out of the way by the sprouting buds of new
leaves in the spring. The beeches are the
| latest of the trees to put on spring suits, and
the commissioner is often notified by some
citizen that he ought to remove a tree be-
| cause, in the citizens opinion, it is dead,
when in fact it is perfectly healthy and only
little slow in recognizing the summer.
The sight of huge piles of mellow tinted
autumn leaves in the numerous public parks
is novel and interesting one. Besides the
uses enumerated above the autumn leaf
| plays in another role. 1t is fashionable for
ladies to deck their bosoms with them in lieu
of flowers, and indeed it is quite common to
press the sered and melowed harbingers of
frost and snow and decorate parlors with
them. 1t is not unusual to see ladies passing
down the avenue wearing a bouquet"
of autumn leaves in their hats or
belts. They are poetical, and hence
popular among the ladies. There is
something ghostly among the larger autumn
leaves. They drop to the pavement often
during the still hours of the night with o
loud snap, and go scudding before the wind
like sheeted phantom. causing the beated
| pedestrian to start from his meditation.
The fashion of collecting autumn leaves is
an old one in Washington, and doubtless
many families still have numerous relics
pressed between the leaves of the old Bible,
which were collected by hands now cold in
death seasons ago.