Country Life
THE CLERGY AS WATCHERS.
A year of success, for which every English patriot should be grateful, has been concluded by the Council for the Preserva- tion of Rural England, whose annual meeting will take place before this is in print. A good suggestion for the future is put forward by Dr. L. P. Jacks in a most lively paragraph. He emphasizes the need of Parish as well as County watchers. "I would suggest, with all respect, that every country clergy- man might be asked to take up the cause as an active watcher, to resist the invasion of his parish by ugliness in any form, and to report to headquarters at the first sign of its approach. For my part I would gladly see a new clause added to the majestic Litany of the Church, and feel I was engaged in true religion every time I repeated it : 'From all destroyers of natural beauty in this parish and everywhere ; from all polluters of earth, air and water ; from all makers of visible abominations ; from jerry builders, disfiguring adver- tisers, road hogs and spreaders of litter ; from the villainies of the rapacious and the incompetence of the stupid ; from the carelessness of individuals and the somnolence of Local Authorities ; from all foul smells, noises and sights—good Lord deliver us ! ' To the country clergy I would add the teachers in every village school.
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