NEW YPRES IS WOODEN

Dominion, Volume 13, Issue 85, 5 January 1920, Page 6

NEW YPRES IS WOODEN

o A CITY OF TRADING AND NOISE The future of Ypres is still uncertain. No one knows at present to what extent the town will be rebuilt as-it was. All that is certain is that the former population of some 18,000 souls are now for the most part at Paris-Plage and Blankenberghe, and that most of them aro anxious to return "home." Thcro are moro than a thousand people living in Ypres to-day, but'these arc mainly ndvwiturers from Brussels and elsewhere who havo been attracted by the chance of making money out of visitors. A now Ypres is rising among the ruins of the old, but it is a wooden Ypres, of a character altogfher rooulsive to all who realise that a quartcr'of a million lives were given to defend one salient which takes its name from tho town (writes a correspondent of the London "Times"). The new Ypres is a place of estaminets, of mobs of picture postcard hawkers, of chars-a-bancs and pleasure omnibuses, or souvenir hunters and noise. •There U a so-called "British Tavern" in the Grand Place itself, and tho road to the Menin Gate is lined with places of refreshment. In the town and its vicinity there aro 135 cafes and cstami"ots, and everywhere among the tumbled beans of bricks and plaster, stones anil men are eagerly hammering and building to increase 'the number, i . It must l)e remembered that the Belirian people as a" whole do not in the least reali--e what Ypres means to Britain and (he Dominions. If they heard of Ypres during the enemy occupation of their country it was (inly to hear that the Germans had the town. Of th" mighty struggle in the salient and of the tenaqity and valour and sacrifice that enabled us to hold it they know little or nothing Ypres (o them is a Belgian town destroyed in the war, just as Dixmudc and Ni"iiport were destroyed, and Thourout, Roulers, and Fiivnes were: part'y destroyed. To them there seems nothing indecent in carrying away something of the debris as a* souvenir, and still less in picnicking joyously among the ruins. I crossed the battlefields from Elverdinghe to Passchcndaelo by way of Boes'iisrhe, Lnnstemarck, Poelcappelle, and Westrnosebekc on foot the 'other day, and except for working parti/; of British troons, German prisoners, or Chinese, and tho motorists on the Ynres rnnd between Poelonpnclle nnd Westroosebeke, I met nobody but rn English officer who was showing his wife where trenches were, onco held by his battalion. After tho noi.-o of tho'cars, the clink of glares and the laughter of Hi.-) throng in Ypres :'t seemed good to be alone among the desolation 'of Hie ridges, where tall rushes in the shellholes and rank grasses and a few hardy flowers covering the torn enrtb only partially veiled the convulsions cf the years of conflict. Up there at am- rate the wounds of war were sometliintr more than a spectacle to be ciwunlly appraised between an aperitif and lunch. The Belgian Government has shown itself very wilk'ng to consider all reasonable proposals in the way of conserving the ruins nnd of ereeiinc memorials. Tt has d«clared .hat (he remains of Cloth Hall, the cathedral, and adjacent buildings will bo left as' they are. Even fo, a considerable amount of attention will be needed if tho walls and tower are to be rendered proof against the weather. It has agreed that a museum shall be erected on the spot whero General Merr'er fell. It has allotted to the Canadians certain sjtes by the Menin Gate. It has promised a site for the erection of an English church. There has been talk of. preserving the whole of th« remains of the town as a rnomorinl. But those who have made this suggestion take .little account of the conservatism of the Belgian freeholder, or of the cost of expropriating him. It is to be presumed that, locally" expropriation on anv large srnle would be a hiir.hly unpopular proceeding. If nothiir; is done, to intervene, it is probable that a year or hvp will see* the private houses of the town rebuilt nraoticalry ns they were before the war. Nothing ;s more remarkable—nor wore characteristic, of tho Belgian people— than, the way in which, nil over Hie country, thev appear to have b~>n satisfied with th-ir old hnnies. While to Hie foreign observer it would seem that Belsrium has at tho present time an exceptional niiportmnty for effeet-'ng improvements in housing, jt must be remmiberfid that in Belgium local autonomy and the 6ense of orivato liberty are ivouliarlv strong, and there, exi?ls' very little legislation to prevent a freeholder from buildmjr any-k'nd of house, however uglv or unsanitary, that f-uitq him. One can on|y_ hop" (hat enlightened Belgian opinion will prevent the erection of "atrocities" on Hi" tiles surrounding the central area which '« lo be left intact. Meanwhile step: should be taken before it is tiy> In la to p-r/ent the estaminet and souvenir shop l from t.ikiim root and dMilinff the mere sacral "art of the town. Tlioy should lw confined to the quarter around the <;|ntion.