Country Towns The first of the new towns directly fostered
by the Government is to be Stevenage, which is roughly halfway between the two first "gardepi cities "—Letchworth and Lemsford, falsely called Welwyn. Tp see good land and a pleasant village swallowed up must be a little sadden- ing, however desirable, but whether the scheme is good or bad on balance —and its alternative is certainly undesirable—a reasonable name ought to be found for these new and artificial accretions. " Garden City " has all the falseness of the pretty-pretty ; and the use of " city," at any rate, is a patent falsehood, though due to that enthusiastic saint, Ebenezer Howard. It is now being repeated in the term "green-belt city," which has nothing whatever to recommend it. Why not simply "country town"? There is no need, except in the mind of those who seek advertisement, to advertise the artificiality of these consciously planned urbanities.
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