Not the least distressing of the losses which we have to mourn is the damage that has been done to the beauty of our English landscapes and the destruction of many scenes of sylvan loveliness. The population of our large towns continues to increase owing to the insensate folly that causes the rural exodus. People imagine that the streets of towns are paved with gold, and forsake the green fields for a crowded slum, and after many vicissitudes and much hardship wish themselves back again in their once despised village home. I was lecturing to a crowd of East End Londoners at Toynbee Hall on village life in ancient and modern times, and showed them views of the old village street, the cottages, manor-houses, water-mills, and all the charms of rural England, and after the lecture I talked with many of the men who remembered their country homes which they had left in the days of their youth, and they all wished to go back there again, if only they could find work and had not lost the power of doing it. But the rural exodus continues. Towns increase rapidly, and cottages have to be found for these teeming multitudes. Many a rural glade and stretch of woodland have to be sacrificed, and soon streets are formed and rows of unsightly cottages spring up like magic, with walls terribly thin, that can scarcely stop the keenness of the wintry blasts, so thin that each neighbour can hear your conversation, and if a man has a few words with his wife all the inhabitants of the row can hear him.

Garden cities have arisen as a remedy for this evil, carefully planned dwelling-places wherein some thought is given to beauty and picturesque surroundings, to plots for gardens, and to the comfort of the fortunate citizens. But some garden cities are garden only in name. Cheap villas surrounded by unsightly fields that have been spoilt and robbed of all beauty, with here and there unsightly heaps of rubbish and refuse, only delude themselves and other people by calling themselves garden cities. Too often there is no attempt at beauty. Cheapness and speedy construction are all that their makers strive for.

These growing cities, ever increasing, ever enclosing fresh victims in their hideous maw, work other ills. They require much food, and they need water. Water must be found and conveyed to them. This has been no easy task for many corporations. For many years the city of Liverpool drew its supply from Rivington, a range of hills near Bolton-lé-Moors, where there were lakes and where they could construct others. Little harm was done there; but the city grew and the supply was insufficient. Other sources had to be found and tapped. They found one in Wales. Their eyes fell on the Lake Vyrnwy, and believed that they found what they sought. But that, too, could not supply the millions of gallons that Liverpool needed. They found that the whole vale of Llanwddyn must be embraced. A gigantic dam must be made at the lower end of the valley, and the whole vale converted into one great lake. But there were villages in the vale, rural homes and habitations, churches and chapels, and over five hundred people who lived therein and must be turned out. And now the whole valley is a lake. Homes and churches lie beneath the waves, and the graves of the “women that sleep,” of the rude forefathers of the hamlet, of bairns and dear ones are overwhelmed by the pitiless waters. It is all very deplorable.

And now it seems that the same thing must take place again: but this time it is an English valley that is concerned, and the people are the country folk of North Hampshire. There is a beautiful valley not far from Kingsclere and Newbury, surrounded by lovely hills covered with woodland. In this valley in a quiet little village appropriately called Woodlands, formed about half a century ago out of the large parish of Kingsclere, there is a little hamlet named Ashford Hill, the modern church of St. Paul, Woodlands, pretty cottages with pleasant gardens, a village inn, and a dissenting chapel. The churchyard is full of graves, and a cemetery has been lately added. This pretty valley with its homes and church and chapel is a doomed valley. In a few years time if a former resident returns home from Australia or America to his native village he will find his old cottage gone from the light of the sun and buried beneath the still waters of a huge lake. It is almost certain that such will be the case with this secluded rural scene. The eyes of Londoners have turned upon the doomed valley. They need water, and water must somehow be procured. The great city has no pity. The church and the village will have to be removed. It is all very sad. As a writer in a London paper says: “Under the best of conditions it is impossible to think of such an eviction without sympathy for the grief that it must surely cause to some. The younger residents may contemplate it cheerfully enough; but for the elder folk, who have spent lives of sunshine and shade, toil, sorrow, joy, in this peaceful vale, it must needs be that the removal will bring a regret not to be lightly uttered in words. The soul of man clings to the localities that he has known and loved; perhaps, as in Wales, there will be some broken hearts when the water flows in upon the scenes where men and women have met and loved and wedded, where children have been born, where the beloved dead have been laid to rest.”

The old forests are not safe. The Act of 1851 caused the destruction of miles of beautiful landscape. Peacock, in his story of Gryll Grange, makes the announcement that the New Forest is now enclosed, and that he proposes never to visit it again. Twenty-five years of ruthless devastation followed the passing of that Act. The deer disappeared. Stretches of open beechwood and green lawns broken by thickets of ancient thorn and holly vanished under the official axe. Woods and lawns were cleared and replaced by miles and miles of rectangular fir plantations. The Act of 1876 with regard to forest land came late, but it, happily, saved some spots of sylvan beauty. Under the Act of 1851 all that was ancient and delightful to the eye would have been levelled, or hidden in fir-wood. The later Act stopped this wholesale destruction. We have still some lofty woods, still some scenery that shows how England looked when it was a land of blowing woodland. The New Forest is maimed and scarred, but what is left is precious and unique. It is primeval forest land, nearly all that remains in the country. Are these treasures safe? Under the Act of 1876 managers are told to consider beauty as well as profit, and to abstain from destroying ancient trees; but much is left to the decision and to the judgment of officials, and they are not always to be depended on.

After having been threatened with demolition for a number of years, the famous Winchmore Hill Woods are at last to be hewn down and the land is to be built upon. These woods, which it was Hood’s and Charles Lamb’s delight to stroll in, have become the property of a syndicate, which will issue a prospectus shortly, and many of the fine old oaks, beeches, and elms already bear the splash of white which marks them for the axe. The woods have been one of the greatest attractions in the neighbourhood, and public opinion is strongly against the demolition.

One of the greatest services which the National Trust is doing for the country is the preserving of the natural beauties of our English scenery. It acquires, through the generosity of its supporters, special tracts of lovely country, and says to the speculative builder “Avaunt!” It maintains the landscape for the benefit of the public. People can always go there and enjoy the scenery, and townsfolk can fill their lungs with fresh air, and children play on the greensward. These oases afford sanctuary to birds and beasts and butterflies, and are of immense value to botanists and entomologists. Several properties in the Lake District have come under the aegis of the Trust. Seven hundred and fifty acres around Ullswater have been purchased, including Gowbarrow Fell and Aira Force. By this, visitors to the English lakes can have unrestrained access over the heights of Gowbarrow Fell, through the glen of Aira and along a mile of Ullswater shore, and obtain some of the loveliest views in the district. It is possible to trespass in the region of the lakes. It is possible to wander over hills and through dales, but private owners do not like trespassers, and it is not pleasant to be turned back by some officious servant. Moreover, it needs much impudence and daring to traverse without leave another man’s land, though it be bare and barren as a northern hill. The Trust invites you to come, and you are at peace, and know that no man will stop you if you walk over its preserves. Moreover, it holds a delectable bit of country on Lake Derwentwater, known as the Brandlehow Park Estate. It extends for about a mile along the shore of the lake and reaches up the fell-side to the unenclosed common on Catbels. It is a lovely bit of woodland scenery. Below the lake glistens in the sunlight and far away the giant hills Blencatha, Skiddaw, and Borrowdale rear their heads. It cost the Trust L7000, but no one would deem the money ill-spent. Almost the last remnant of the primeval fenland of East Anglia, called Wicken Fen, has been acquired by the Trust, and also Burwell Fen, the home of many rare insects and plants. Near London we see many bits of picturesque land that have been rescued, where the teeming population of the great city can find rest and recreation. Thus at Hindhead, where it has been said villas seem to have broken out upon the once majestic hill like a red skin eruption, the Hindhead Preservation Committee and the Trust have secured 750 acres of common land on the summit of the hill, including the Devil’s Punch Bowl, a bright oasis amid the dreary desert of villas. Moreover, the Trust is waging a battle with the District Council of Hambledon in order to prevent the Hindhead Commons from being disfigured by digging for stone for mending roads, causing unsightliness and the sad disfiguring of the commons. May it succeed in its praiseworthy endeavour. At Toy’s Hill, on a Kentish hillside, overlooking the Weald, some valuable land has been acquired, and part of Wandle Park, Wimbledon, containing the Merton Mill Pond and its banks, adjoining the Recreation Ground recently provided by the Wimbledon Corporation, is now in the possession of the Trust. It is intended for the quiet enjoyment of rustic scenery by the people who live in the densely populated area of mean streets of Merton and Morden, and not for the lovers of the more strenuous forms of recreation. Ide Hill and Crockham Hill, the properties of the Trust, can easily be reached by the dwellers in London streets.

We may journey in several directions and find traces of the good work of the Trust. At Barmouth a beautiful cliff known as Dinas-o-lea, Llanlleiana Head, Anglesey, the fifteen acres of cliff land at Tintagel, called Barras Head, looking on to the magnificent pile of rocks on which stand the ruins of King Arthur’s Castle, and the summit of Kymin, near Monmouth, whence you can see a charming view of the Wye Valley, are all owned and protected by the Trust. Every one knows the curious appearance of Sarsen stones, often called Grey Wethers from their likeness to a flock of sheep lying down amidst the long grass of a Berkshire or Wiltshire down. These stones are often useful for building purposes and for road-mending. There is a fine collection of these curious stones, which were used in prehistoric times for building Stonehenge, at Pickle Dean and Lockeridge Dean. These are adjacent to high roads and would soon have fallen a prey to the road surveyor or local builder. Hence the authorities of this Trust stepped in; they secured for the nation these characteristic examples of a unique geological phenomenon, and preserved for all time a curious and picturesque feature of the country traversed by the old Bath Road. All that the Trust requires is “more force to its elbow,” increased funds for the preservation of the natural beauty of our English scenery, and the increased appreciation on the part of the public and of the owners of unspoilt rural scenes to extend its good work throughout the counties of England.

A curious feature of vanished or vanishing England is the decay of our canals, which here and there with their unused locks, broken towpaths, and stagnant waters covered with weeds form a pathetic and melancholy part of the landscape. If you look at the map of England you will see, besides the blue curvings that mark the rivers, other threads of blue that show the canals. Much was expected of them. They were built just before the railway era. The whole country was covered by a network of canals. Millions were spent upon their construction. For a brief space they were prosperous. Some places, like our Berkshire Newbury, became the centres of considerable traffic and had little harbours filled with barges. Barge-building was a profitable industry. Fly-boats sped along the surface of the canals conveying passengers to towns or watering-places, and the company were very bright and enjoyed themselves. But all are dead highways now, strangled by steam and by the railways. The promoters of canals opposed the railways with might and main, and tried to protect their properties. Hence the railways were obliged to buy them up, and then left them lone and neglected. The change was tragic. You can, even now, travel all over the country by the means of these silent waterways. You start from London along the Regent’s Canal, which joins the Grand Junction Canal, and this spreads forth northwards and joins other canals that ramify to the Wash, to Manchester and Liverpool and Leeds. You can go to every great town in England as far as York if you have patience and endless time. There are four thousand miles of canals in England. They were not well constructed; we built them just as we do many other things, without any regular system, with no uniform depth or width or carrying capacity, or size of locks or height of bridges. Canals bearing barges of forty tons connect with those capable of bearing ninety tons. And now most of them are derelict, with dilapidated banks, foul bottoms, and shallow horse haulage. The bargemen have taken to other callings, but occasionally you may see a barge looking gay and bright drawn by an unconcerned horse on the towpath, with a man lazily smoking his pipe at the helm and his family of water gipsies, who pass an open-air, nomadic existence, tranquil, and entirely innocent of schooling. He is a survival of an almost vanished race which the railways have caused to disappear.

Much destruction of beautiful scenery is, alas! inevitable. Trade and commerce, mills and factories, must work their wicked will on the landscapes of our country. Mr. Ruskin’s experiment on the painting of Turner, quoted in our opening chapter, finds its realisation in many places. There was a time, I suppose, when the Mersey was a pure river that laved the banks carpeted with foliage and primroses on which the old Collegiate Church of Manchester reared its tower. It is now, and has been for years, an inky-black stream or drain running between stone walls, where it does not hide its foul waters for very shame beneath an arched culvert. There was a time when many a Yorkshire village basked in the sunlight. Now they are great overgrown towns usually enveloped in black smoke. The only day when you can see the few surviving beauties of a northern manufacturing town or village is Sunday, when the tall factory chimneys cease to vomit their clouds of smoke which kills the trees, or covers the struggling leaves with black soot. We pay dearly for our commercial progress in this sacrifice of Nature’s beauties.