The question of a Public Park is being agitated, and with every hope that it will be carried to successful results.  But little attention has been given this matter by any of our cities until a very recent period; and now their beauty and utility having been established, many towns are moving in this most important matter.  St. Paul can afford to issue bonds liberally to this end; and should the district under consideration be secured, including the beautiful Lake Como, little elaboration will suffice to make it immediately a notable feature of the town.

The strata of blue limestone near the surface, and on which the city practically stands, is of great value, and quarries can be opened anywhere, from which good building material in unlimited quantities can be had at small cost; easily competing with lumber in the market, which is likewise plentiful, as we shall see when we come to look into the history and growth of the sister city on the river, above.

This stone already constitutes the chief material used in the erection of all the better class of buildings in the city, and, indeed, Third Street, the principal business thoroughfare, has even now little else than this honest and solid-looking material to represent it.

The sandstone underlying the magnesian limestone, and which is so soft as to be easily crushed, could be used we judge in the manufacture of glassware at great profit to the manufacturer; but as yet, there is nothing done that we know, and it is not strange when we reflect that it is but a score of years since St. Paul was really occupied and settled.  All of this various strata of rock and sand belongs, geologically speaking, to what is known as the lower silurian system, extending from near the western shores of Lake Michigan, and sweeping over all the lower half of Minnesota, westward and upward along the valley of the great Red and Assinniboin Rivers to the north, marking one of the most prolific grain growing belts on the continent, if not in the world.  While this limestone underlying the surface is valuable for the purposes heretofore named, it performs a still greater service to mankind in having contributed much of those qualities which have given in certain departments of agriculture, highest prominence to the State.

St. Paul is both the political and commercial capital of Minnesota, and must always remain such without doubt, though it does not occupy a central geographical position, still it is the practical centre of the commonwealth, made such by the enterprise of her people in extending the system of railways in all directions, with this point as a pivotal centre.  There are already seven important roads[A] radiating from this city, either completed or in rapid course of construction, giving at the present time a total of about seven hundred miles of finished road, over which daily or more trains run, and all within the boundaries of the State.  Other lines beginning and ending elsewhere, yet likewise in the State, are not included, of course, in this consideration.  These roads penetrate already, or will when completed, the principal centres of trade and agriculture lying in the Northwest.