VANDALS ON HOLIDAY.

Grey River Argus, 6 November 1911, Page 2

VANDALS ON HOLIDAY.

A writer in tli« "Evening Stand- 1 ard" compiles a depressing list of beautiful and interesting places in I i'nglaaiid that have had. t-a .be closedon account of the. thoughtlessness or vandialism of holiday-makers. He 1 tells how one summer morning he' visited a secluded nook in a cornier of one. •of the Norfolk Broads and wafl enchanted with .the beaoity of i [the yei'low-lillies . .and the- cool, refreshing, green, of tie -leaves. When • later in the • day he - revisted the spot "the 'layer of • leaves 3 ; gemmed ' with flowers, had been cut ' . into ; unsightily channels .by. %c .passage 1 of a piratical • boait impelled by -dc- . moniac oaa-smen; ruthless hand& had ' torn up many of -the plants by -their ' roots and cast the -wreckage adrift \ upon the watea*s; no one- flower was 1 left as a- witness of the loveliness 1 j that had been-"- Most- 1 of - the spoil I [ liad gone to decorate; a boait v It , is acts like -these -that have compefll- . ed some of the owners of beautiful , , lakejets in thisi part of England' to I , put beams across the entrances, axid notices stating • tfhafc- the public are excluded. Oee owner told the , writer .thai not a J lilv; or . a wild- • flower, or a "fern, 'was safe from the ravagers- The concession •of owners of 1 ancestral parks to ' the public is often abused: ChaiTeoote Park, ! the Warwickshire propeiity coauiectled with 1 the youth of ■ Shakespeare, was closed for seveiraj years because visitors wantonly frightened the deer, tore up plaints, ' and " broke off branches ofi "trees.- ' The beautiful , Shemingham ' woods may be. closed some day ' if ( . the holiday-maker goes on tearing off great masses of rhod- i odendrons. ' There was a time when visitors to Lichfieild- Cathedral might wander about' at will "and" admire the building 1 and ite«. sculpture' ." But « one 'afternoon someone ' broke a hand off a group of sitatuaay, to carry it away as a memento, and i now one must ' go round . with a " verger and! listen to his talk- In . one of the', loveliest paiibs of -Warwick " shire .stands Blacklow .H2L -where a, • stone -memorial bears Uiis inscription:—"ln the hollow of this rock " was beheaded on. the ,firsti -day of ' July, 1312, by barons lowless as ■ himself, Piers Gavcston, Earl of '-»mwa,!l, tth'ei -minion' of ,a hateful king.'! The hill used t o be open to ■ the public , but visitors pulled ' up plants, injured itaees, .and de- ' faced the stone , memorial, so now a notice stands :— "Owing to the' mis- ' sion to Blocklw Hill is n '! longer ' grouted!-" /-These ; are only a, few of ' many -melancholy", instances .of the sellfisliness of the few Vccoiling* on the ' pleasure of the; many. • ' :