Country Life and Sport
Tim NEw Zoo.
The coming country Zoo at Whipsnade (deliciously English name !) will give a new attraction to England. I revisited the spot this week and found no reason to alter an old con- viction that the view from The edge of the chalk hill is one of the most glorious in southern England, quite the most glorious in the Home Counties. But it is the ground itself and the shape of the contours that matter most. Much of the land is scarcely cultivable. Indeed there are fields that have already been allowed to go back to thorns and briars and are as derelict as the area purposely left to native relapse at Rothamsted. But this condition is what best suits wild animals. The chalk already shaped into queer chambers can be carved as a sculptor would carve it ; and thin though the soil is, we have many trees and plants that enjoy a chalk subsoil. The botanists let loose there should enjoy themselves hardly less than such "animal architects" as Mr. Boulanger or Miss Procter. And imagine the joy of a director who, after being confined to forty acres, has the run of four hundred, with a chance--may we hope ?—of yet more !
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