HURTFUL VANDALISM

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 209, 29 May 1919, Page 6

HURTFUL VANDALISM

Sir,—The old pine trees in the Botanical Gardens are being cut down, and it will very shortly be top 4ato to stay this vandalism., May appeal to the Mayor whom wo have just elected to intervene with a. strong hand and save these trees? As a citizen of Wellington, he knows how long it has taken to grow thorn, and how few other trees worthy of the name there are in Wellington. , In i'rance, where trees are prized and respected in a manner unknown in England, there is a special protection for trees in ■which the public have a particular interest. In other countries, such trees havo legal protection. The law cannot interfere with trees on private property, but it can place restrictions on the hasty felling of all other treos. There are parts of the British Empire whore no trees (not on private iproperty) useful to the public can be felled without going through formalities which are troublesome, and may. bo expensive. . There is no such law in New Zealand. Anyone in temporary authority, a road overseer, for • instance, can fell trec3 which it has taken half a century to produce, and which, if they are cut, may leave a legacy of half a century of regrets before, they can be replaced. 'If, from any of j:he neighbouring heights, one looks down on the bare windswept streets of Wellington, the cases where there are trees are conspicuous. Of these the Botanical Gardens is one, and this oasis is being hastily destroyed. Snrely it is possible for those who have done the recent .good work in the Botanical Gardens to'continue clearing a.way scrub and improving, without touching the tall trees.—l am, etc., ■ SPECTATOR.