districts that are continually being absorbed by towns. Half the squalor of modern suburbs is due to indiscriminate development. Trees are cut down and houses are run up along a main road. Traffic increases, and the tenants move away. The houses are clumsily converted into inefficient shops, extending over the front garden, or into seedy inefficient tenements. Empty plots are covered with hideous hoardings. Without undue interference with the liberty of the subject, much of this feckless muddling could be avoided by the exercise of a little rational foresight. For this is a question deeply affecting the whole community, not a petty professional grievance. The mad race from towns to the fringe of the country is destroying the country for miles round: and the pathology of destruction is now clearly understood. A brilliantly realistic description of the growth of “Bromstead,” a typical London suburb, is to be found in Mr. H. G. Wells’ _The New Machiavelli_. All who have witnessed the slow spread of this malignant disease will agree that he does not overstate the case. IV THE AGE OF PETROL (1910 ONWARDS) It may well be objected that this is a mere journalese title, for the influence of motoring on the appearance of the countryside is not always apparent, and many other factors have been at work, among them the Great War and its considerable legacy of troubles. Moreover, some readers may point out that motor-cars were to be seen in England long before 1910. That is true; but they did not appreciably alter our countryside before that date, and the number of them was relatively small.