er and on ever wider fronts. The role of Jeremiah is not an
agreeable one in a traditionally optimistic and forward-thrusting
society, but those of us who care about the health of the world around
us seem to be forced into it often in these times. Therefore let us look
at somber matters.

We have catalogued the pollution of the river system and the ways in
which it diminishes this most fundamental and valuable resource. We have
seen how it varies through the Basin's streams according to the
concentrations of people and the kinds of activities they engage in, and
have noted that it is truly bad--deep-rooted, past a point of easy
return--on the North Branch where coal and industry prevail, and in the
upper estuary where the population is heaviest, with localized serious
conditions on the Shenandoah, the Monocacy, and a number of smaller
streams. And because land and water depend on each other and reflect
each other's condition, these tend to be the places where the general
environment is having the most trouble too.

The metropolis

Washington and its environs have always been a cynosure for American
eyes, a place people have wanted to be proud of and have fought to keep
"right." Many of its defenders have been powers in the land, and for a
long time in the past the battle was generally a winning one. Even aside
from the city's planned monumental Federal center with its government
buildings, memorials, formal parks, malls and avenues--largely traceable
to the ideas of Pierre L'Enfant and the sporadic respect paid them by
the founding fathers--it has amenities undreamed of in and around most
American cities: things like the Potomac Great Falls and gorge with the
C. & O. Canal alongside, Arlington Cemetery, Mount Vernon, the
Georgetown neighborhood where private taste and determination have
brought a near-slum back to 18th-century grace and function, Roosevelt
Island, several fine local and regional parks, the George Washington
Memorial Parkway along the Potomac, and incredible Rock Creek winding
down its natural valley through the Maryland suburbs and the District to
the river.

[Illustration]

Yet the rampaging growth to which the metropolis, in common with other
American centers of population, has been subject during the past two or
three decades means not only that these pleasant places are being
pressed upon by many more people than anyone thought they would ever
have to serve, but also that some of them are in