NATIONAL PARKS
[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.]
SIR,—Sir Francis Acland was evidently in a somewhat skittish mood when he wrote the letter which you published on October 29th. I doubt whether the urgent need'of defending the beauty of our country from disfigurement is really a Suitable subject for jesting ; but I have sufficient sense' of humour to appreciate the fact that Sir Francis Acland reserved his grimmest joke for the postscript of his letter. In suggested that some encouragement might be derived from the fact that the Forestry CommisSion intends to create a " National Forest Park " in Snowdonia.
Now I have no intimate knowledge of Wales and until recently knew nothing except from hearsay about the work of the Forestry Commission in the Principality. But a month ago I happened to revisit the Mawddach Valley and spent a night at the Tyn-y-Groes Hotel, which is well known to lovers of Welsh scenery. It was the first time I had been there since 1922. The river with its dark pools and chattering rapids was as delightful as ever. On the right bank, below the hotel, the grand old deciduous 'trees flanking the ravine were exquisite in their beauty and formed a glorious foreground to the view of the hills in the direction of- Dolgelley: On the other side of the river the steep bracken-clad slopes of Penrhos to the left were blazing With the richest colour's of autumn. Mit, immediately opposite, this grand hillside was cut—as by the gash of a knife across a picture of Titian'i- by a horribly straight fence which formed the boundary of a dense' and uniform plantation of conifers. When saw this, I said to myself : " That looks uncommonly like the handiwork of the Forestry Commission." So I crossed the bridge to find out. Sure enough, there was the Commission's notice-board. And before darkness came to hide that incon- gruous blotch of livid green I was told an astonishing story of footpaths diverted, of a particularly fine view utterly hidden by the mass of conifers, and of local protests treated with disdain.- . I cannot vouch for the truth of the story, for I had no time to investigate .the matter. I simply report what I heard. But the next znoming on my way to Dolgelley saw for the first time, on another of the. Forestry Commission's plantations, something . of which _ previously I had only a hearsay knowledge—the ghastly skeletons of deciduous trees which had been " ringed." They form a prominent feature in the view from the charming ruins of Cymmer Abbey, which are now in the safe hands of the Office of Works ; and-I cannot remember to have seen anywhere a more wanton and loathsome piecenf vandalismp
As one who has for many years admired Sir Francis Acland's long 'devotion to the public service, I ant very sorry that on
this. occasion- the only direction- in which I- can follow is
in his use of the Latin language. And, when I hear of she Forestry Commission's proposed " Forest Park " in Snow- donia, the Latin which comes into my mind is a tag almost too hackneyed to qUote : Timeo Danaos et Bona ferentes. In the annals of crime it is not uncommon to find a criminal changing his name ; and the change is seldom a symptom of conversion or the prelude of reform. Is . there any guarantee that if the plantations of the Forestry Commission are called " Forest Parks" instead of just " Forests " they will be radically different from the uniform masses of Christmas trees with which the Commission has disfigured so many beautiful
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