The Pleasantville press. (Pleasantville, N.J.) 1912-1929, 1922-06-21

Court of st. james, and Richard Wash
burn Child at the Court of Italy.
There always has been IL certain
percentage of literary men In the con-
sular service. In the old dnys before
appointments TO consular positions
were in any way regulated by the age
of the applicant 1t was the occasional
habit of Presidents to give easy posts
to men of writing fame SO that they
might work a little for their govern
ment, and a little for themselves amid
%congenial surroundings.
Among men of writing fame who
capacity or another in the diplomatic
service, are or were Arthur Slier-
bourne Hardy. James Jeffrey Roche,
Albion w. Tourgee, Francis Bret
Harte, Francis II. Underwood. and of
course james Russell Lowell and 9TH
err greater lights.
When Albion w. Tourgee was serv-
ing his country as consul ut Bordeaux,
France. he wrote for the pages of the
Daily Consular Reports n of the fin
est descriptive articles of its specific
kind that is known. Certainly no gov
eminent document issued for the few
and casual readers ever contained any
thing so compelling.
Toureee's Reforestation Report.
The title of the article was simply
"Reforestation in France" The first
few lines showed little of interest.
Then the eye reached this:
o. zone after anGt!er great waves of
sand, moved by the restless winds that
swept across the Atlantic, continued
their unceasing march across the fair
plains of southern France burying all
before them-fields, meadows. vine
yards, houses. churches, even villages
leaving behind them only gray bill
lows to which chung punches of brack-
en-, a few starved bushes of scrub oak,
fighting stubbornly for Il hold upon the
shifting sands. with here and there
some struggling groups of pine, the
protesting remains of Il grent forest
which wind, and sand. and fire, and
water had spared"
II a TN pNSiiih'fc Va " 'NRN Il
ton of the irresistible march of the
gray sand dunes from the shore of the
Bay of Biscay toward the heart of the
most productive land in Europe. The
story, for this old official communici-
ton Is Il true story. continues: 'On
the seward side the great burrows,
lying one within the other, were bare
and gray. The western winds lifted
the light sands, and dropped them just
beyond the crest to drown and smoth-
err the shrubs which struggled up the
leeward side. Here and there in IA
vorable places a few scattered pines
marked the location of the ancient for
ests to which the Greeks, and the
Romans, perhaps even the Phoenici-
ans, came for timber and pitch and
left their names on the shore to mark
the limits of forgotten commerce.
"They brought with them. not only
reckless greed. but still more reckless
fame, which, cooperating with the
steady western winds and the sand
| thrown up by the restless waves, ate
away the forests and left only the
shifting dunes-great sand pillows
that crept on inch by inch and year
by year entombing more Of the bright
blossomed ~bruyeres and genets. no
matter how bravely they fought for
existence, leaving behind them only
dry roots, which the 'forestiers' gath
cred for their hearths.
Napoleon Stopped the Devastation.
"On and on crept the phalanx of
the terrible dunes, slowly but surely
blighting all Gin their path, not only
creating a desert but destroying hope.
AS long as the winds blew from the
west the dunes marched to the east
the desert fires ravaged the interven-
ing ~spaces-nocks grew fewer, the des-
olation more extreme. In the heart of
SUNNI France a desert was established.
ever increasing in extent and threaten
ing to stretch across its fairest fields,
the %aridness of the Sahara"
Bremontier, n of the ons of the
seemingly doomed region, conceived
an idea of saving the country. 1t was
Napoleon who seized upon the thought
of Bremontier. Ills VISION penetrated
the centuries ullu nt SAW lile' iiidfCii Ol
the deadly dunes arrested and the des-
ert they had created made to blossom
like a rose"
Today, as we are told. the seeds of
the pin maritime" of the French
were gathered and sprouted and the
young trees planted.
Now the dark squadrons of the pin
maritime are posted on thousands of
sandy slopes, faithful guardians in the
shelter of which the vineyards and
wheat fields rest secure. The gray
dunes which were sweeping over the
land have become serried fortresses
which shelter civilization and pros
perity."
Sometimes 1t seems that a "l%iterary
consul" is worth while.