Nice touch. Letter from a friend, written on a train journey in France, and on return faxed to this recipient. It runs: "Travelling through Normandy by train, the countryside appears beautiful, orderly and serene. Villages nestle in the valleys, manor houses set just a little apart. Great balls of mistletoe hang in the trees, and hawks hover overhead. In almost every garden there are table and chairs - the French love their `dejeuner sur l'herbe.' Even the names of the towns are evocative of past ages - Bayeux, Caen, Lisieux, Evreux, each with its huge, impressive cathedral.
"But the orderliness and serenity are deceptive," he writes. "We all know of the French farmers barricading the roads to hold their Government to ransom." And the owner of a Normandy chateau tells how, in the last century, a local politician settled an old score by routing the new local railway through the chateau's estate. Now French railways are seeking to close the line on the grounds that most local people have cars and the line is therefore uncommercial. Another part of rural France is threatened.
"The railway company (SNCF) apparently runs this train both slow and late, in order, say the locals, to discourage passengers. Well, that's one story. The owner of the chateau some time ago raised a new herd of an old breed, Vaches Salers. The day came when the rail track was so quiet that the entire herd followed the leader, one by one, on to it. Inevitably a train came and slaughtered all 20 valuable cattle. The story even made the national headlines.
"The insurance company had never encountered an entire herd being mowed down by a train and agreed only to pay for one animal. To add insult to injury, the owner had to compensate French railways for delays on the line. He swore never more to breed rare cattle or to trust insurance companies. But he does travel, by rail, at least twice a week between Paris and Normandy, so that he can cater for, and enjoy his beloved family chateau."