FRANCE BEST

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 351, 11 May 1928, Page 9

FRANCE BEST

Places to Live In

N.Z. FOR HEALTH

DEAN INGE MAKES SURVEY (United P.A.—By Telegraph — Copyright) (Australian Press Association.) LONDON, Thursday. The Dean of St. Paul’s, Dr. W. R. Inge, writing in the “Evening Standard,” discusses the question, “Which is the best country for civilised people to live in?” He says that on the whole Europe is the only part of the world where there are no deserts. It is the most favoured continent. It is not by an accident that Europeans have taken the lead in civilisation. ( The people of the countries round the North Sea, and their offshoots in Arne--rica, Australia and elsewhere, own three-quarters of the wealth of the world, and eleven-twelfths of the steamships. They produce nine-tenths of the manufactures and control twothirds of the earth’s habitable territory. A rough circle drawn round England, Scotland, France, North Italy, South Norway, Sweden, Holland, Denmark, Belgium, and Germany would comprise most of the civilised parts of the Old World. The healthiest countries axe the Scandinavian lands, England, Holland and the new overseas countries in which their people have settled. NATURE’S GIFTS TO FRANCE ‘lt is a striking fact, however we may try to explain it,” says the Dean, “that the low death-cate extends even to Iceland, which few people would choose as a health resort. Australia and New Zealand seem actually to be the healthiest countries in the world. “A good case could be made out for England as the finest country in the world to live in, but on the whole I would give the palm to France, which has a larger area, a more varied climate, and one coast open to the Mediterranean.

“I know of no country to which Nature has been quite so bountiful. Even Englishmen must admit that if civilisation is the art of making the most of life, the French have cultivated it more than any other nation in the world.”