CONFERENX'E OF DELEGATES. 445 



Lake District tlie buildings in the villages and surrounding can be most 

 suitably roofed from slate quarries, which are located in the midst of the 

 mountains and sometimes amid most beautiful scenery. As to flora & 

 fauna, there should be no great difficulty in a large area in obtaining certain 

 tracts of sufficient remoteness and refraining from making them accessible. 

 Even a little active obstruction, provided it does not lead to unscaleable 

 fences, could well be practised. Everyone knows certain mountain 

 pastures which are almost inaccessible owing to boggiuess or to extremely 

 rough going through loose stones or scrub. The normal wanderer sticks 

 to a well-known path. 



As regards the recreative object, access to the National Park should be 

 made as rapid and comfortable as possible, but once arrived in the domain 

 reasonable facilities for getting about should be aimed at, but no more. 

 Speed tracks should not be encouraged, and people who have almost 

 forgotten how to walk must be content to miss some of the choicer beauties 

 of the area. A comparison of the Lake District and North Wales will 

 show how more fortunate is the former in that the main roads that traverse 

 it are so few and have to rise up so high as compared with the more level 

 valley bottoms that lead through Snowdonia in nearly all directions. At 

 the same time it is interesting to note that there is a larger massif of 

 unpenetrated mountain area in North Wales than there is in the Lakes. 



§3. 



With regard to the methods of obtaining areas, these fall under three 

 headings. In the first place and simplest there is the u.se of existing Crown 

 lands ; thus it might be said that the New Forest and the Forest of Dean 

 are practically National Parks already. At most a slightly different attitude 

 of the Crown Departments to their property would be necessary, such as 

 with regard to economic afforestation or the selling of land for building 

 purposes. Both these uses of the land might be changed, radically or 

 imperceptibly, if the areas were to be primarily used for recreation. 



The second method, the most complete for the purpose, would be the 

 purchase of private property, giving more thorough possession even than 

 the Crown lands, because the latter are all subject to very considerable 

 easements, whereas the rights for private property, including minerals, 

 would be practically entire. But, attractive though this would be, the 

 expense involved even for wild and barren land would be prohibitive. It 

 is probable and desirable that large areas should continue to be purchased 

 even within the National Park, and to be vested in the National Trust, as 

 has been done in the Lake District ; and it is hoped that these trust owner- 

 ships will continue and will include both agricultural as well as wild 

 country, as is the case in the Langdale Valley. There are certain places 

 which everyone must feel should be in full public ownership. 



For the re.'^t the third type of holding for a National Park appears to 

 be inevitable, namely, a control of private ownership on somewhat the 

 same lines as that exercised under the Town Planning Act for growing 

 areas. Such control of private ownership would have to be of a .stringent 

 nature in order to safeguard the special amenities of a National Park, and 

 it is therefore more than probable that questions of compensation to 

 owners will arise. If the park is for national use this compensation should 



