Richard Mabey

摘要

I WAS IN THE FOREST of Fontainebleau, just south of Paris, researching my book on beechwoods. But for a moment, I felt I'd been transported into New York's Central Park. There were tribes of orienteers, cyclists and horse-riders. Rock-climbers finger-tipped their way up the massive sandstone rocks. Solitary tai-chi practitioners posed by the side of lissom trees. And all this in an immense mosaic - 140 km~2 - of hardwood plantations, ancient beeches and tracts of heath. But there's an extra-special feature of Fontainebleau. Parts of it were the first nature reserve to be established in western Europe -not as a result of their biodiversity or scientific interest, but because they had touched the hearts of a spirited gang of local painters, the Barbizon School of the mid-igth century.