"IX. No person is to engage in dangerous exercises. If the superintendent judges any form of exercise by any person to be dangerous, it is to be considered so and refrained from by that person.

"X. No part of the apparatus is to be put to other than its proper use or to be used with excessive violence.

"XI. In any use of the track the right side of the person is to be kept toward the fence line.

"XII. Persons not engaged in putting the shot or hammer are to avoid the ground assigned to those who are so engaged.

"XIII. Any person violating either of the above rules is liable to a fine not to exceed $20 for each offense, and will forfeit the right to the use of the playgrounds for the season."

Washington is in many respects the ward of the nation. A large portion of its area, comprising its avenues and streets, parks, park places, and numerous unimproved and partly improved public spaces, together with the magnificent and costly public buildings, are the property of the nation. Progressive city improvements, and especially modern park creations, which are carried forward to successful issue by municipal authority and private enterprise in other prominent American cities, are accomplished here mainly through Government aid. It is apparent, therefore, that public playgrounds as an addition to our present park system, and which an almost universal sentiment indicates as a very near, if not an actual, present and imperative need, must be a further provision for Washington by the General Government, and Congress will have to provide in large measure the means for their creation, maintenance, and permanent support.

In this connection it is a fortunate circumstance that it will not be necessary to dispense with any of our highly improved parks or park places, in which our people take so much pride, for there are numerous unimproved and comparatively unimproved public spaces of sufficient area located in the northern, southern, eastern, and western sections of the city that can be converted into model playgrounds of the various classes before described, many of which can be reached by present car lines, and all of which will doubtless be easily accessible in the near future, for which we must now provide.

The following unimproved and comparatively unimproved public spaces, embracing nearly all sections of the city which are being rapidly built up, are in many respects desirable locations for such public playgrounds:

Reservation 170, Vermont avenue between T and U streets; area, 11,695 square feet. Reservation 178, New York avenue between Fourth and Fifth streets; area, 7,181 square feet.

Reservation 133, New Hampshire avenue between Twenty-fifth and Twenty-sixth streets west; area, 8,816 square feet.

Reservation 105, Virginia avenue between Twentieth and Twenty-first streets; area, 11,096 square feet.

Reservation 185, Florida avenue between First and Second streets east; area, 7,618 square feet.

Reservation 228, Delaware avenue between M and N streets north; area, 7,093 square feet.

Reservation 219, Delaware avenue between I and K streets south; area, 25,642 square feet.

Reservation 244, Georgia avenue and R street south; area, 20,234 square feet. Reservation 122, Virginia avenue between Fourth and Fifth streets east; area 15,916 square feet.

Reservation 126, on Virginia avenue between Ninth and Eleventh streets southeast, already set aside as a playground, should receive further improvement and be equipped with modern appliances that are suitable for children's playgrounds. Playgrounds of the largest class which contain so many desirable park features as to become places of public resort might be located in Howard University Park, (reservation 20), between Fourth and Fifth streets and College and Pomeroy streets, comprising an area of nearly 12 acres. This reservation is partly covered by a native forest growth and is easy of access, being in close proximity to the terminal stations of four of our city and suburban street railroad lines, and it is of sufficient extent to include picnic grounds and ball grounds and well-equipped playgrounds. A section of Potomac Park of about an equal area to Howard University Park should be devoted to a like purpose for south and west Washington.

Parks combining playgrounds and abundant space to serve also as places of public resort are now found in and bordering many of the crowded cities of both our own country and Europe, and in some cases are well illuminated and are open at night, affording very desirable and healthful resorts for outpourings of their surcharged populations.

Public parks of a very much more extensive character with broad expanses of meadow land, lakes fringed with trees and shrubs, wide, well-shaded driveways, bridle paths, and walks for general travel, etc., are now found bordering the metropolitan cities of Europe and many of the large cities of the United States.

London, England, has over 33,000 acres devoted to parks, park places, and playgrounds, and from a pamphlet lately published I find that four millions of dollars was recently expended by its municipal government to procure a small (so called) breathing space in a congested part of that city. Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, and other large American cities have each expended many millions of dollars in accomplishing their park creations, and are now opening in their congested sections small playgrounds, which require a very large expenditure of money. Ten such small spaces opened in Chicago cost over a million of dollars, and the Hon. Jacob Riis, in his book on the slums of New York City, states that similar creations in congested sections of New York City cost over a million of dollars each.

In Washington, if Government reservations should be used, the main outlay, the purchase of land, would not be required. The cost of construction alone would have to be provided by Congress, which for the smaller public playgrounds would be approximately from $500 to $1,000 each, and for the two combined parks, Howard University Park and Potomac Park, approximately $20,000 each. Respectfully submitted.

GEO. H. BROWN,
Landscape Gardener.

APPENDIX C.

NOTES ON CODIÆUMS, A GENUS OF VERY ORNAMENTAL TROPICAL PLANTS, NUMEROUS VARIETIES OF WHICH ARE GROWN AT THE PROPAGATING GARDENS OF THE PUBLIC GROUNDS, BY GEORGE H. BROWN, LANDSCAPE GARDENER.

The name Codiæum is derived from the Malayan name given to one of the species indigenous to that country, but these plants are more generally known by the popular name of Crotons, from which family, however, they are now known to be botanically distinct. The genus comprises four species of shrubby Euphorbiaceous plants indigenous in the Malayan Archipelago, the Pacific islands, and the tropical sections of Australia and South America.

Codiæum variegatum, one of the first varieties introduced into the United States, constitutes a political emblem in Brazil, the green and yellow of its leaves and stems approximating the blending of the national colors.

The numerous varieties now grown by commercial florists and the extensive collections of this class of plants in the principal garden establishments of Europe and America have been obtained chiefly by hybridization and from sports (branches and offshoots varying in character and markings of color from the parent plants), which, on being removed and propagated, retain the varied character.

Of the six new varieties shown in the frontispiece, Nos. 1, 2, and 3 are the result of successful crossing (hybridization) at our gardens, and Nos. 4, 5, and 6 are sports. Our collection at the propagating gardens comprises over seventy-five distinct varieties and is classed as one of the best collections in the United States.

The Codiæums are unexcelled by any other class of plants for the decoration of halls, churches, etc., on occasions of public assemblages; also for the embellishment of rooms and for dinner-table decorations, the brilliant combinations of colors displayed in their foliage ranging from light green and yellow to the deepest shades of orange, and from light pink and green to the deepest shades of crimson, making them especially attractive either when grouped alone or in combination with palms and ferns.

They are a most serviceable class of plants for furnishing conservatories during the summer and autumn months, thriving with indoor summer cultivation where other classes of plants fail. They are also an especially desirable class of plants for park decorations, either massed in groups or planted in beds with other foliage plants. When used for this purpose they should be hardened off in a cool greenhouse for a few weeks before the planting-out season for tropical plants, which in Washington is about the 1st of June.

Operations during the last fiscal year have included work related to the several features above referred to, as follows:

Charts. The following statement shows the number of charts received and disposed of at this office during the fiscal year ending June 30, 1903:

On hand July 1, 1902..

Received from Chief of Engineers

Prepared in this office.

Returned by United States engineer office, Buffalo, N. Y

13, 440 5,898 26, 446

Sold....

Issued for official use

Transferred to United States engineer office, Buffalo, N. Y.

20

45,804

11.573

2,868

2,007

638

Destroyed, out of date..

On hand July 1, 1903..

28, 718

45, 804

The total number of charts sold by this office during the year was 11,573, the total amount received from these sales being $2,009.05, which was duly deposited to the credit of the Treasurer of the United States. The total number of charts that have been sold, issued, and transferred through this office to June 30, 1903, is 271,076, including issues to the United States engineer office at Buffalo.

Extensive corrections and additions to copies of the following-named charts were made in this office and forwarded to the Office of the Chief of Engineers for the guidance of the engravers in correcting the copperplates, viz:

1. St. Clair River; scale 1:40000.

2. L'Anse and Keweenaw Bay; scale 1:30000.

3. Coast chart No. 5, Lake Michigan; scale 1:80000.

These corrections and additions included changes in aids to naviga tion, modifications due to river and harbor improvements, latest magnetic determinations, additional and corrected sailing courses, and the most prominent topographic and hydrographic changes developed by commercial and industrial enterprise on the shores of the lakes and their tributary and connecting rivers.

The changes constantly being made in lights and buoys render necessary a very large amount of hand word, as every chart is corrected for all information received to the very day it is sent out of the office.

In continuation of the policy of eventually issuing all lake-survey charts in colors, copperplates were revised and corrected in this office for transfer to stone and printing in colors, as follows:

Issued July 24, 1902.
Issued July 25, 1902.
Issued August 5, 1902.

Issued August 27, 1902.
Issued October 10, 1902.
Issued October 20, 1902.

1. Coast chart No. 1, Lake Ontario; scale 1:80000. 2. St. Lawrence River No. 6; scale 1:30000. 3. St. Lawrence River No. 5; scale 1:30000. 4. Coast chart No. 5, Lake Erie; scale 1:80000. 5. Coast chart No. 6, Lake Erie; scale 1: 80000. 6. Coast chart No. 7, Lake Erie; scale 1:80000. 7. Coast chart No. 2, Lake Ontario; scale 1: 80000. 8. Detroit River, scale 1:40000, with lithograph inset "Lower Detroit River" on scale of 1:10000. To the inset were added soundings and contour lines from the latest ice surveys made in 1902 under the direction of Maj. W. H. Bixby, and also the new channel at Amherstburg reach with the changes in aids to navigation made October 22, 1902. The fourth revised edition in colors. Issued February 3, 1903.

Issued November 20, 1902.