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appearing there in person. The central library also supplies 191 public and parochial schools, 37 institutions and 59 fire company houses. More than 100,000 card holders have the right to obtain books for home The total number of volumes is about 1,200,000, besides newspapers and periodicals which number upward of 3,000. In Bates Hall (the main reading room of the central library), about 10,000 volumes are kept on open shelves for reading and reference.

use.

There is also a room set aside for young readers, a teachers' reference room, and special facilities in connection with university extension courses. The fine arts department affords opportunity for copying and photographing and contains a large collection of photographs of architecture, sculpture, paintings, etc. Free lectures are given during the winter season, mostly on art topics, and special assistance is offered to classes, traveler clubs, etc., and some free concerts are given.

The trustees of the Public Library, five in number, are appointed by the Mayor, one each year, for a term of five years. There are forty-one library trust funds in the custody of the City Treasurer, amounting to a total of $675,372 on February 1, 1922, the annual interest derived being used for the purchase of books. The expenditures for library purposes in 1921-22 were $734,892.

Perhaps of all the public libraries in the country none surpasses the Boston Public Library in adequate service and in the variety of its collections. No building in Boston exceeds it in beauty of architecture; and its interior has become known to the world through the mural paintings and decorations by Puvis de Chavannes, Sargent and Abbey.

It is a monument to intelligent municipal administration and a worthy house for immortal works in literature, art and the sciences.

PUBLIC GROUNDS, PARKS AND
RECREATION.

Boston has always guarded with jealousy the public grounds she possesses. The first charter forbade the municipal council from selling the Common without the consent of the voters. The low lands extending to tidewater in the Back Bay, which had been purchased from the owners of the Ropewalk in 1824, at a cost of $25,000, were also kept intact, so that "a bountiful supply of fresh air might be let into the city." Beyond the Common, the Mall, and the different burying grounds, Boston had no public grounds requiring a constant outlay until the administration of Josiah Quincy, Jr., 1846–48. The expenditures for their upkeep were correspondingly low, except for the cost of surrounding the Common with an iron fence ($90,000), which was in part borne by private subscription.

Josiah Quincy, Jr., in his second inaugural, strongly advocated the need of public parks. The first large venture under him was the purchase of Dorchester Heights in South Boston at a cost of $112,000. The tract was to be used both as a park and as a site for a new reservoir. Beyond this the city government contented itself for a while with larger expenditures for beautifying the Common and the city squares in the old residential sections.

With the improvement of the Back Bay came the first opportunity to establish a modern park within the city limits. Between the Boston Common and the town of Brookline lay a stretch of marsh land upward of 700 acres in extent which was covered by water at high tide. Already in 1814 the so-called Boston and Roxbury Mill corporation had been chartered to improve the Back Bay. It built two causeways, one to the west along the present Beacon street, the other southward to Roxbury and branching off from the first. The

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Roxbury causeway divided the Back Bay into two basins, the western one emptying into the eastern which was the "receiving" basin, so that tide mills could be constructed along the causeway. A second company had been chartered which in 1832 acquired all the property and privileges of the Boston-Roxbury Company south of the Beacon street causeway. Boston, wishing to drain into the receiving basin, had entered into an agreement with the new Water Power Company to that effect and had ceded it 100 acres for the privilege, with the proviso that the water in the basin should always be kept below a level needed for working the tide mills. But before long, milling by tide power became unprofitable; the Water Power Company neglected to keep the water at the proper level; and the receiving basin was filled with sewage, threatening to become a serious menace to the public health.

The only remedy was to fill in the Back Bay marsh, and as land was rapidly rising in value, the Water Power company wished to take advantage of the situation. For a time the Commonwealth blocked the project. Under the old laws, individuals could claim ownership of shore land stretching to the low tide level to the extent of one hundred rods. Any land uncovered beyond that distance belonged to the Commonwealth. It therefore laid claims to the Back Bay lands "below the ordinary line of riparian ownership,' for they promised to be of great value. Moreover, it was held that the ship channels might be injured by reducing the flow of water through a general filling in of the marshes. The negotiations between the Commonwealth and the Boston Water Power Company resulted in the two becoming partners in the work of reclaiming the Back Bay, the latter having been converted into a land company (1856).

But Boston had its own claims to press. An agreement was reached in 1856 by the three parties interested whereby the Commonwealth ceded to Boston a piece of land to the west of the bottom of the Common and agreed to build a sewer across the Back Bay into the Charles river. The Commonwealth and Boston

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