RECENTLY from daybreak to evening my house and garden were pervaded by the smell of burnt meat.

My conservatory roof was spotted with particles which eventually developed mould rings. I suspected not atomic reactor explosion fallout, not volcanic eruption ash, not Black Country factory fire asbestos, not coalburning power station acid rain, not Saharan sand, not a neighbour's culinary disaster, but rather drift from beyond the horizon foot-and-mouth pyres using low-grade coal and smouldering through wet days and nights.

If the first pyres were lit in Northumberland and Berkshire when prevailing winds were rotating north east, east, south east, it would not be unreasonable to imagine virus carrying fallout on pastures in Cumbria, Herefordshire and Devonshire.

If on Throckmorton airfield pyres are lit and foot-and-mouth virus, BSE agent and who knows what else are haphazardly released to the four winds on wings of particles and vapours to drift who knows where then who knows the price communities will pay for these seemingly desperate, hazardous follies macabre?

ROBERT THOULD, Hawthorn Road, Evesham.