PARIS — The crow of a rooster and the ringing of a church bell at dawn. The rumble of a tractor and the smell of manure wafting from a nearby stable. Perennial rural sounds and smells such as these were given protection by French law last week, when lawmakers passed a bill to preserve “the sensory heritage of the countryside,” after a series of widely publicized neighborhood spats in France’s rural corners, many of them involving noisy animals. “Life in the countryside means accepting some nuisances,” Joël Giraud, the French government’s junior minister in charge of rural life, said on Thursday. It would be illusory, he said, to idealize the countryside as a picture-perfect haven of tranquillity.

Source: New York Times January 24, 2021 12:26 UTC