TRAGEDIES OF VANDALISM

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22509, 17 September 1938, Page 21

TRAGEDIES OF VANDALISM

MANY years must elapse before the ancient Druidical temple at Stonehenge on Salisbury

fßy WEAMAN JAMES.] of the half-crazy Martin, who did so much damage to York. Minster. The Greeks knew how to deal with these fellows. . ... . „ j Sheer ignorance is responsible tor the loss of irreplaceable treasures, at times. Not until too late was it found that the leases of a fine Caxton book, preserved in a French Protestant church in London, had been used for lighting the vestry ares. Instances of this kind of thing might be multiplied. An antiquary, poking about old Hungerford Market, found a fishmonger wrapping up his wares in paper covered with writing of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. He investigated; and the thrill he had when he found what the wrappers really were may be imagined. There were documents signed by Henry VII and Henry VIII, a treatise in the writing of Edward VI, and a State memorandum penned by Queen Elizabeth. Cautiously the discoverer probed the honest merchant of fish. The latter had nothing to conceal. I get all this waste paper from Somerset House," said he. "I bought 10 tons, all odds and ends, as you see; but it's really too stiff for wrapping fish in!" War, the Greatest Vandal Mob-ignorance plays its part in the destruction of precious objects of art -and literature, as when the priceless library of Dr. Priestley was destroyed in the Birmingham riots. Even more widespread was the havoc caused by the Gordon riots in London. Lord Mansfield's library, full of rarities' which' could never be replaced, was only one" of the treas-ure-repositories sacrificed to the fury

Plain recovers its origjnal appearance. An. evening's senseless frolic, when some young officers "celebrating" daubed the venerable stones with green paint, had results which time only can efface. The type of mentality which can find "fun" in defacing a historic monument is hard to understand, but it is not uncommon. Many years ago, a young naval lieutenant deemed it sport to overturn the famous logan stone near Land's End, which he did with the help of some of his crew.. The Admiralty had a sense of humour of its own, and ordered the high-spirited young nrian to replace the stone in its former position. - Altogether, his bit of fun cost him £2OOO.

Unfortunately—as some may think—no such penalty was visited upon the vandal who destroyed the famous Portland Vase. This beautiful specimen of Greek art was brought to England by a former Duke of Portland, and placed in the British Museum, where all who chose could enjoy its attractions. One day a crash sounded through the room, and the lovely vase lay in fragments on the floor. The vandal was a drunken fellow, whose only excuse was that he committed his wanton act of destruction "on an impulse." Ignorance and Notoriety It is good to note that the vase was cleverly restored; it now rests, "as good as new," in the Museum as before. Because of the state of the law at the time, the offender got off with a fine. Sometimes these acts of vandalism are done from a wish for fame, or notoriety. A case in point is that

Fish Wrapped in Royal Documents

of the misguided. mob. Places of worship were looted, involving the defacing of statues and pictures, and the loss of valuable plate and vestmerits. Altogether, the "bill" for the losses caused by the infatuated followers of Lord George Gordon (not to mention the criminals who took advantage of all the excitement) was a tremendous one. -..*-, The restoration of Rheims Cathedral, recently celebrated, reminds us that vandalism inevitably follows in the wake of war. Unhappily, some of the treasures which vanished in the years from 1914 to 1918 are impossible to replace." In 1870, German shells fired into Strasburg, detroyed the library there, one of the priceless things which perished being the earliest printed Bible. Records which established Gutenberg as the first printer were also among the dumb and innocent victims of the bombardment. During the same conflict, the exigencies of war compelled the French themselves to burn the palace of St. Cloud with all its priceless contents. To the lover of beautiful things, the senseless and brutal destructiveness of war is not the least of its horrors. Many treasures perished at the suppression of the monasteries under Henry VIII: Illuminated manuscripts worth more than their weight in gold were used for lighting fires and for mending broken windows. Later on in our history, the destruction of church property by Oliver Cromwell's soldiers does not bear thinking about. Stained-glass windows dating from the Middle Ages, and consequently impossible of .replacement, were ruthlessly smashed, and so the bad work went on.