The Press Saturday, July 20, 1929. Changing England.

Press, Volume LXV, Issue 19676, 20 July 1929, Page 14

The Press Saturday, July 20, 1929. Changing England.

All lovers of rural beauty, especially those who know and love the English countryside, will be delighted to learn from the letter which we print to-day from Mr lan Macdonald, a Canterbury farmer at present in England, that a resident of Somerset has presented to the Councils for the Preservation of Rural England and Wales the sum of £IOOO, and offered further to subscribe money up to a total of £IO,OOO in proportion to the help received from other sources, '" as " a form of insurance against the evils "of unchecked development." Even those dwellers in New Zealand wh*o have not been fortunate enough to visit England, and can hardly hope to do so, will doubtless rejoice to know that such vigorous measures are being adopted to preserve that natural (and acquired) beauty which has charmed generations of visitors, inspired so many generations of poets from Spenser to Tennyson and Bridges, and remained a perpetual joy to those who live in Britain, whether in the mansion or in the cottage. Travellers agree that no country in the world surpasses Britain in the delicacy, the charm, and above all in the variety of her natural scenery, which includes such widely, differing types as the mountains of Scotland and Wales, the lakes and fells of Cumberland, the wild moors and ferny lanes of the West Country, the stern wolds of Yorkshire, the lovely chalk downs of Sussex, and the heathclad commons and breezy heights of Surrey, quite close to London. Further, the domestic architecture, both of the individual house or cottage, and of the village or small town as a unit, has been guided for ages by bo sound j and fine an aesthetic instinct that the ancient villages, hamlets, and farmhouses seem rather to be a part of ' Nature than an addition by the hand 1 of man, and have won the admiration j of the world. L

Prompt and energetic measures are necessary if any part of this beauty, natural and acquired, is to be saved from the hand of the spoiler. Much has been already destroyed. Petrolstations in crude and glaring colours jar upon the nerves of the traveller everywhere in the very heart of rural England and Wales; famous " beauty - " spots" upon the coast aiid elsewhere, such as Land's End, Alum Bay, Beachy Head, and the Punchbowl, are defiled by the leavings of careless picnickers; old woods come down and jerrybuilt villas take their place; gaudy advertisements disfigure the trim fields and the shady woodsides, and rustic lanes are transmogrified into bare, straight, and graceless motor-roads.

Some of this destructive change is of course unavoidable; the fine old hedges—" little rows of sportive wood " run wild," as Wordsworth has itmust be trimmed and cut back lest they endanger life by obstructing the view of the motorist; roads must be dressed with unlovely tarmac; numerous petrol-stations of some sort are an absolute necessity in this age. That the British public is fully alive to the danger is shown by the fact that there are already 29 constituent and 70 affiliated bodies—the Councils for the Preservation of Rural England and Wales—working hard to protect the amenities of the countryside and striving by every means in their power to minimise the unavoidable evils and to obliterate or tone down the grossest of the eyesores which have already appeared in so many places. Unfortunately this is not a case where the law can be usefully appealed to; the only hope for the future lies in the education of public opinion and the guidance of public taste by judicious propaganda, bringing pressure to bear upon the local bodies responsible for roads and bridges, etc., and upon enterprising and interested individuals. All this costs much money. In a strong appeal for funds, launched through The Times, as a result of Mr Penrose's gift, by Lord Balcarres (president of the central body) and by chairmen of local Councils, it is stated that the organisation cannot possibly cope with the vast number of complaints which they continually receive from every quarter. It rather strengthens than weakens the appeal to know that Mr Penrose is not an Englishman but an Apierican domiciled in England who wishes to save his adopted country from the worst of the evils which have overtaken the American countryside.