Evening star., 1921-04-23
The Botanic Garden Problem.
To the Editor of The Star:

There are evidently two very differ
ent ideals in the controversy over the
botanic garden site One of these,
which is probably widely prevalent in
the city and perhaps dominant in
Congress. is founded upon what the
Washington botanic garden has been
in the pasta very limited exhibition
collection of beautiful and curious
plants at a central station to be Wis
tied by citizens and strangers like a
museum. The other ideal is that of a
roomy ground where every conceiva-
BILE plant can be grown. whether of
horticultural or only scientific inter-
est. 1t would include an arboretum
as we'll as a garden in a narrow
sense. Trees and shrubs would be
shown in groups, according to their
natural relationships. Thus there
would be vale of rhododendrons.
like one l have heard of but not seen
in Prospect Park. Brooklyn. There
would be a magnolia grove. a quer-
cetum foaks). salicetum twillows),
a pinetum (pineS) and many other
etums. There would be systematic
groups of great numbers of herba-
ceous plants. There would be glass
houses of different temperatures to
accommodate different classes of ten
der plants. There might very well
be gardens representing the styles of
Inherent JAPANESE gar
den. an English. a Dutch. an italian
garden. Besides all this. it would be
very desirable to have piece Of ma
tive forest and other areas where ma
tive plants could grow in A wild state.
Such garden would. of course. be
laid out as far as practicable on land
scape principles. There should be
places for parties to boil their coffee
and eat their lunch. Every one sees
at once that this plan could not be
carried out with any approach to ade-
quacy without at least a square mile
of land. and twice that would be much
better.
Now the present writer is not opposed
to the provision of one or more small
gardens with greenhouses at central To-
cations, perhaps one not far from the
Geological Park. But the establishment
of sNs'h could not be regarded as final
solution of the problem. The larger
he satisfactory to botanists. and there
will continue to be calls for something
to match the Kew gardens near London
until the want is met. But the longer
the delay the more difficult will it be to
secure proper site. The Mount Hamil-
ton tract is not large enough unless an
extensive area lying to the north can be
added to it, Botanists, I understand,
have given their approval to this choice,
but l believe more because it seemed
the best that could be hoped for than
because it is really satisfactory Two
other areas could easily be suggested.
which I believe would be preferred by
a committee Of the competent. provided
it were instructed to report strictly on
merit.
Every one will admit that a garden
such as has been imperfectly projected
above would be magnificent asset to
the National Capital. A niggardly. half
way provision for this want would be
most unfortunate. It would not pay in
the end A plea for delay might have
some force. were it not that the oppor-
tunity is passing. Get the land and de-
velop the garden slowly If need be. 1t
could be utilized as a wild park and pre-
serve until cultural plans could be car
ried out. EDWARD S. STEELE.