COUNTRY LIFE
Worcestershire Worcestershire, one of the Three Graces, is to have a special branch of the Council for the Preservation of Rural England. It has peculiar need. The county contains a number of special gifts. It holds some of the best Cotswold villages, which are acknowledged to be the crown of England. It holds some of the richest valleys (about- the Teme and the Avon), and I suppose no other scene of its sort in England compares with the white plum blossom seen from any slope above Evesham or Pershore. Some of the worst examples of the assassination of rural beauty belong to this quarter of England. Nothing is quite so sacrilegious as the sacrifice of the approaches to Stratford-on-Avon in Warwickshire, where Mr. Flower most generously saved the last of the unspoilt approaches after Mr. Trevelyan had sold his estate without precautions. Worcestershire farmers, and fruit growers have kept the county beautiful ; and it still inspires local writers, though Shropshire excels it in this regard. Mr. Evans, the postman- poet of the Crooked Steeple, lives over the border. Inciden- tally, his latest tales of Cleobury Mortimer are as good as any. Protection is needed in all these counties, especially in an architectural reference ; and if there is a criticism of the C.P.R.E., it is that the Council is too architectural. Certainly their best work concerns architecture ; and the first work of the new branch, which will probably be formed on Feb- ruary 25th, should be to persuade local councils to arrest the flagrant habit of substituting villas for trees. The need- less, indeed the foolish, destruction of trees, is a mania with the speculative builder.
Previous page
