A BUSH VALLEY FIFTY YEARS AGO

Press, Volume LXXI, Issue 21418, 9 March 1935, Page 9

A BUSH VALLEY FIFTY YEARS AGO

TO THB EPITOE OF THE I'KESS. Sir,—l read Mr Gibson's long letter which ends up on the "miserere" note—"Man marks the earth with ruin." God's processes must have looked like ruination to prehistoric man, if He were around when the Volcanic Peninsula was heaved up. There would be no Garden City of Christchurch if they were not there to arrest the silt brought down by the Waimakariri. Some poet sings, "Where every prospect pleases, but man is vile"; but poets get far ofE the track of facts often. Man has admittedly done some villainous things marring the beauties of Nature; yet on the other hand he is "making"' things —making the Canterbury Plains less plain with his plantations and water races. The pioneers, of course, did many silly things in their ignorance. Sheep scab, rabbits, blackberries, and many other abominations in the right of the farmer were allowed to creep in, and some of them brought in to make this virgin land more English like. When the Scotch thistle seeds started flying in the wind, my father got the wind up and wished to 11 ee the country. Where was the population, the farmers with their "spuds" Uhe small hoe on the end of a walking stick) to cope with this pest? However, the Scotsman proved to be a friend; it was noticed that he would down a patch of fern on good land. A later enemy to fern and manuka was found in the danthonia grass, which has changed many acres in Marlborough into grassland; the danthonia permitting more frequent firing. "11l fares the land, to hastening ills a prey," etc. More poetry, and this time, more near to facts. Some writers on this page say that our antiquated money system has brought some of these ills closer, and the decay being man made will not improve until man sets to work to improve himself by the help of God. With all our mistakes we have not marred this God favoured country; we are increasing the area of our scenic reserves, and rightly so, as one of our destiniesis to become one of the playgrounds of the world; another, to be the breeding ground of high class animals, human beings included. To do this we may have to take a leaf out of Russia's book. I see that prayers are being offered up that God may be allowed to remain in Russia, which shows how small some conceptions of God are. I suppose it would be considered somewhat sacrilegious if some sect were to offer up prayers that we may soon become more like Russia, where they are damming their rivers at the same time as presumably they are camning their souls; anyway, the attempt is being made to alter the face of Nature, and to make alterations in what may be called the science of living. Many of us "old hands" will regret with Mr Gibson the disappearance of many forms of life in old New Zealand, the mischievous weka and his ways, for instance; but the young folk won't miss them because they have never known them. Nothing is static; we must move on.—Yours, etc., PETER TROLOVE. March 7, 1935.