negie. This has since been
published:

P. GEDDES. City Development. Park Gardens and Culture Institutes; a
Report to the Carnegie Dunfermline Trust. With 138 illustrations.
Edinburgh, etc.. 1904.

[Page: 119] DISCUSSION

The Chairman (MR. CHARLES BOOTH) in opening the discussion said:

The paper we have just heard read is one of the most complete and
charming papers on a great and interesting subject I have ever heard. I
think you will all agree in this, and I hope the discussion which
follows will emphasise and, if that is possible, add to the wealth of
ideas that this paper contains.

MR EBENEZER HOWARD (Founder of the Garden City Association) said:

I have read and re-read--in the proof forwarded to me--Professor Geddes'
wonderfully luminous and picturesque paper with much interest. He has
given us a graphic description of the geographic process which leads to
the development of the city. We see vividly the gradual stages by which
the city grows and swells, with the descent of the population from the
hillsides into the valleys, even as the river which flows through the
city is fed continually by the streams which flow down to it. But is
there not this essential difference between the gathering waters of
heaven, as they pour into the great city, and the gathering tide of
population, which follows the path of the waters? The waters flow
through the city on, on toward the mighty ocean, and are then gradually
gathered upward into the soft embraces of the clouds and wafted back
again to the hills, whence they flow down once more to the valleys. But
the living stream of men, women, and children flows from the
country-side and leaves it more and more bare of active, vigorous,
healthy life: it does not, like the waters, "return again to cover the
earth," but moves ever on to the great city, and from thence, at least
for the great majority, there is no chance of more than, at best, a very
short stay in the country. No: the tide flows resistlessly [Page: 120]
onward to make more crowded our overcrowded tenements, to enlarge our
overgrown cities, to cause suburb to spread beyond suburb, to submerge
more and more the beautiful fields and hilly slopes which used to lie
near the busy life of the people, to make the atmosphere more foul, and
the task of the social reformer more and yet more difficult.

But surely there must be a way, could we but discover it, of imitating
the skill and bountifulness of Nature, b