Town and Country

New Zealand Listener, Volume 14, Issue 358, 3 May 1946, Page 5

Town and Country

T would be interesting to know how many of the thousands of people who went into the country for Easter left no gates open, lit no foolish fires, took no undisciplined dogs with them, fired no blind shots, damaged no fences, stampeded no stock, and did no other unreasonable thing to leave a trail of resentment behind them. It is the kind of knowledge that no one ever has, though it is the key to reasonable relations between town and country. A majority of city people do behave properly in the country, but there is a minority whose conduct is nearly always bad, partly through selfishness and partly through lack of imagination. To begin with, many city people forget that Nature knows nothing about high days and holidays and observes no regular days of rest. The hens lay, the cows give milk, the crops go On growing and the stock keep on eating whether city hours are 40 every week or 48, and it is not easy for country workers to remain philosophic and cordial when all a public holiday means to them is an addition to their routine anxieties. It is not surprising that they are sometimes inhospitable to innocent trampers, and have been known to exploit drivers of broken-down cars. What is surprising is the fact that they are so often friendly and helpful. In George Orwell’s satire, Animal Farm, the revolutionaries discover that all animals are equal, but that some animals are more equal than others. It is not being too extravagant to suggest that many farmers have come to feel about city workers as Orwell’s animal drudges came to feel about the talkers and managers on Animal Farm. They agree that leisure is one of the rewards of science. But they would agree a little more heartily if science distributed its rewards equally; and since that is at present impossible, they think that those who do enjoy such rewards as frequent holidays should have the grace to enjoy them quietly and not as disturbers of rural economy and peace.