cheerfully giving the millions which we have counted, is yet giving and expects yet to give, every year, for a generation to come, other millions to develop the capacities of its Park and to perfect its beauties: and all this, too, from pure æsthetic and humane impulses, without any sordid arriere pensée of the ultimate reimbursement in dollars and cents, which will, no doubt, be made through the increased value which the Park will give to all the neighboring property, the business revenues it will attract to the city, the saving, through its kindly influence upon the public health and morals, and in many other ways. Upon this head the Controller of the city says, in his report for the year 1859, that "the increase in the amount of taxes accruing to the city, in consequence of the enhancement in the value of real estate situated in the upper part of the island, over and above the former value of the land now withdrawn from taxation, on account of the opening of this noble park, will, it is thought, afford more than sufficient means for the payment of interest on the debt incurred for its purchase and improvement without any increase in the general rate of taxation." No spot could be more dreary and forbidding than was the site of our Park before the improvements were begun three or four years ago. "The southern portion," says one of the reports of the Board of Commissioners, "was already a part of the straggling suburbs of the city-and a suburb more filthy, squalid, and disgusting can hardly be imagined. A considerable number of its inhabitants were engaged in occupations which are nuisances in the eye of the law: and THE ALCOVE-NEAR THE MALL. were consequently followed at night in wretched hovels, half-hidden among the rocks, where also heaps of cinders, brick-bats, potsherds, and other rubbish were deposited." The grading of streets through and across it had been commenced, and the rude embankments and ragged rock-excavations thus created added much to the natural irregularities of its surface. Large reaches of stagnant water made the aspect yet more repulsive; and so ubiquitous were the rocks that, it is said, not a square rood could be found throughout which a crow-bar could be thrust its length into the ground without encountering them. To complete the miseries of the scene, the wretched squatters had, in the process of time, ruthlessly denuded it of all its vegetation except a miserable tangled underbrush. the region, for the seductive attractions of pond and fountain. It was with a comprehensive and intelligent perception of these extraordinary natural advantages of the locality that the Commissioners, architects, engineers, and laborers set to work, not to torture and destroy as would have been the process in past days, but (in the more enlightened spirit of landscape-gardening which now happily obtains) to develop and enhance. To accomplish this gigantic task three thousand men set head and heart at work, aided by all the powerful resources of art and science and an unstinted purse. This army of laborers has now been busy during four long years, and is still busy constructing roads and bridges and arch-ways; turning dreary wastes into grassy lawns, collecting the straggling brooklets into expansive lakes; here leveling the ponderous rock, and there exposing it in more striking and picturesque aspect. Still, despite this forlorn condition of the neighborhood, its great and varied capacities of beauty, under proper culture, were plainly manifest to the educated eye, in its changing hills and dales rising a hundred and forty feet above tide-water, or nestling forty feet below the grade of the surrounding streets. It was not a difficult thing to imagine the swamps of stagnant water, drained and turfed as they have been into broad verdant meadows; to collect the bright waters of the unruly brooks into peaceful lakes; to replace the vile hovels with beautiful summer-houses and arbors, and to see noble carriage-ways and inviting foot-paths stealing every where through the glens and thickets.-expending curiosity and fancy upon this and The proximity also of the great reservoirs of the Croton Aqueduct indicated ample supplies of water, over and above the natural resources of Not the least agreeable feature of the Park, at the present time, is the vivid contrast between the quiet elegance and beauty of the finished and available portions, and the busy bustle and confusion of other sections still in the various stages of construction. It will be pleasant by-and-by to wander about the livelong day, meeting every where with nothing to change the spirit of one's dream of beauty and repose; but it is also most agreeable now to watch the progress of the works that enigmatical beginning, and to be warned now and then against the dangers of the impend. ing rock-blasts. This last incident is a notable SUMMER HOUSE IN THE RAMBLE. "Fire!" is quickly shouted along the line, the matches are hastily lighted, and the air resounds as with the noise of a cannonading army. On the right and the left, before and behind, here, there, and every where, are seen the ponderous discharges, filling the air with the smoke and smell of villainous saltpetre and the huge fragments of the sundered rocks. A few minutes thus elapse, when the bell rings once more, the cry of "All over!" is echoed from flag to flag, the sudden blockade of travel is removed, and equestrians and pedestrians pursue their various ways again as they severally list. The only portion of the Park which is yet much frequented, or in which any considerable improvement has been made, is that lying below the Tower and the old Reservoir at Sev enty-ninth Street. This part, from the southand very exciting one. It is conducted with such | ern boundary at Fifty-ninth Street up, embraces a admirable caution that not one of the tens of little more than a third of the whole area, and thousands who daily witness it have ever received will probably be known as the "Lower Park," or have, indeed, been in any way exposed to the in contradistinction to the upper section, from slightest injury. These blasts, which are very which it is partially separated through the occunumerous and upon a grand scale, are made pation of much of the central third-speaking in daily at the same moment all over the Park. general terms-by the reservoirs of the Croton At noon warning is rung out from the bell- Aqueduct. This lower division is a noble park tower, and visitors in carriages or on foot are of itself, quite sufficient in its extent and attracsuddenly brought to a halt or turned to places tions to exhaust the hours of the longest and of security by the cries of the keepers and the busiest summer day. Being the most easily acshouts of the flag-men. When all is safe, the cessible to the masses of the population below, watch-word, "All clear!" is passed from one it has naturally received the earliest attention, flag to another throughout the grounds; the even to the temporary neglect of the more remote bell tolls again and again, until the final portions. Its capabilities are, however, less-as moment at length arrives, when the word its beauties will ultimately be-than those of the THE HAMBURG SWANS. Upper Park, reaching from the northern end of the new Reservoir at Ninety-sixth Street to the boundary at One Hundred and Tenth Street. The leading points of attraction and resort up to the present time are the Grand Circuit, or the Tour, as the broad carriage-road is differently called, the Glen, or Bridle Road, the Ramble, the Central Lakes, the Mall, and the superb Water Terrace. The Tour, or Drive, is a spacious Macadamized road for vehicles, with a wide foot-path on either side. It makes the entire circuit of the grounds, commencing at the corner of the Fifth Avenue and Fifty-ninth Street. In its serpentine course it embraces all the great architectural and scenic features of the Park: the lakes, bridges, lawns, and reservoirs, and all the beautiful vistas beyond. In November, 1859, about three miles of this noble avenue were opened for public use. At this time more than twice that distance is completed, or is in immediate process of construction. Its entire length, when finished, will be nine and a half miles. It is substantially and elegantly built, in part upon the Macadam and in part upon the Telford methods. In its course-which will be found traced upon our "Map of the Park"-it crosses many fine bridges and arch-ways, now over and now under the footpaths and bridle-roads, and across the sunken and tunneled passages which give public transit, here and there, through the Park. It presents a brilliant and inspiriting spectacle, as seen upon sunny afternoons, when alive with the whirl of a thousand gay and gorgeous carriages, bearing the élite and fashion of the city through their daily airing. The Bridle Road follows the great carriageway, with many capricious détours, through all the long circuit of the Park. It is entirely shut out, however, from the carriage route, which it never crosses except upon arch-ways above or below. It is intended exclusively for horsemen, and is nowhere accessible to vehicles, though equestrians may enter the carriage-roads when they please. In width it varies from twenty to twenty-five feet. Some considerable portion of this picturesque ride is now in use, and when completed its total length will be between five and six miles. The Commissioners propose to add a winter drive to the present picturesque net-work of road, which, when covered with snow and merry sleighs, will be one of the most unique and beautiful incidents of Park experience and enjoyment. It is to be about a mile and a half in length, upon the west side of the grounds between Seventy-second and One Hundred and Second streets. It will be thickly planted with evergreens, with such deciduous trees and shrubs only as may be needful to prevent a monotonous and gloomy effect. Open glades of grass will break the uniformity of these masses of evergreen, so as to produce the effect of a richly wooded and varied landscape, rather than of an unbroken forest-land. The Ramble is a charmingly wooded labyrinth of thirty-two acres, lying upon the broad hillslope which drops down from the lower end of the old Reservoir at Seventy-ninth Street to the margin of the Central Lakes. It is a wonderfully secluded and quiet spot, quite undisturbed in all its generous extent by any road except the intricate foot-paths, which dance merrily and coquettishly hither and thither, through rich shrubbery of ever-changing form and tint, leading the willing wanderer, amidst their inexplicable mazes, now into the grateful shade of some Arcadian bower, and anon to the crest of some rocky cliff, overlooking the sunlit landscape far and near. It is the spot of all spots in the great Park for dreams and reverie, and will naturally become sacred to sentiment and love. Of its capabilities in this wise under the soft spell of summer moonlight, glinting through the parting verdure upon the gentle ripples of the silvery lake below, we can not trust ourselves to speak. For the delights of the Ramblewhich, with all their beauty, are as yet only in the bud of brighter promise-we are especially indebted to the rare taste and skill of Mr. Olm ted, the accomplished architect-in-chief of the | like a modern belle-it is spanned by a noble Park. wrought-iron foot-bridge, with a single arch of The Central Lake is an exquisite reach of eighty-seven and a half feet. This structure is bright waters, covering an area of twenty acres, called the Bow Bridge, from its general likeness and bounded by a shore of infinite variety and in form to a long bow; and sometimes the Flowbeauty. Upon the upper side are the wooded er Bridge, in consideration of the heavy vases slopes of the Ramble, stealing down with gentle of trailing plants which surmount its abutments. grassy step, or jutting out in bold, rocky prom- Another beautiful bridge carries a carriage-road At the southeast is the grand marble and walk over the channel connecting the main esplanade of the Terrace, with its gorgeous arch- and western portion of the lake, and yet anothes, fountains, steps, and statues. At its narrow er, near by-most picturesquely constructed of waist beyond-where it is almost cut in two, wood-conducts a foot-path across the little bay ontory. |