WHEN I wrote last November that the dominance of cars in Washington, DC, made it difficult to comfortably explore the environs on foot, David Summers in Shanghai indicated the contrary, and sent me a copy of Louis J. Halle's "Spring In Washington" (The John Hopkins University Press, 1988.).

When I received the book on January 1, my attention was immediately drawn to the beautiful drawings by Francis Lee Jaques.

That can only come from an artist who share the author's love of nature, and has not yet mastered the art of cost efficiency.

A few pages into book convince me it deserves a review. And there is no better time to do this than today when the weathermen can confidently pronounce the advent of spring simply because they have giant computers.

The book is a chronology of signs of spring in Washington in 1945, by a young bicyclist who appointed himself monitor of the changes.

Signs of spring

Usually he had pedaled miles before his office work began. To him, the seasonal changes are sign of eternity and examining them is "the noblest of occupations."

Thus he regarded his observations of the seasons in off hours as being more serious than his official duties at the US State Department.

Today many measure degree of human civilization by its distance from nature.

Modern homes and offices can satisfactorily insulate the inmates from the world outside, and the danger of exposure to natural elements while migrating between the two locations is minimized by the air-conditioned metal boxes.

Of course some underprivileged people are still compelled to rely on their own resources for mobility, but the world is developing fast.

Ten years ago I could still conveniently taste signs of spring in the farm fields around my in-laws' suburban home in Shanghai. The concrete jungle had long overtaken it.

Urban planners all over the world are destroying what they do not understand at an alarming rate. They conceal their stupidity by parroting such terms as poverty, prosperity, and growth.

In their eyes nature itself is in urgent need of improvement.

Have you noticed the freshness of the lush foliage sprouting on the shrubs by the road? They have done so without our leave, and so at their own peril. Before long someone armed with electrical shears will prune them of their wild naturalness, their luxuriance, and their spontaneity.

I am lucky that I can still hear the music of birds in my neighborhoods.

Are they stopping over on their migration to Siberia? Halle observes that these migratory birds remain fixed on the sun, using it as a compass, and it is the world that tilts under them.

A week ago when I escorted my son to his kindergarten, he asked why a minivan racing by had two smoke-belching pipes. I replied that two exhaust pipes mean greater consumption of fuel, which ensures greater speed.

My son then asked: "Could greater speed prolong their (riders') life?"

Children see more because they have not yet been totally "civilized" by our education.

"A government functionary would not believe you should you tell him that the price of wolfram in Turkey today is not so important as the perennial process of budding and leafing in the neighboring woods," Halle observes. This is in spite of the fact that "The spring shall make you free, the price of wolfram will enslave you."

If observation of birds and nature is essential to the understanding of the world and wisdom (Roger Peterson in his preface), then Halle's escape from reality (as he was charged by some) as a federal employee could be justified by his belief that if the environment is shabby, the thinking and the impulses of statesmanship will become shabby as well.

We arrived in Washington in early November last year, and in retrospect I failed to appreciate fully the colors of the falling leaves. When we left in late January, I was guilty of another oversight: I did not make any effort to perceive the first signs of spring in Washington.

Halle registered the first signs of spring in 1945 on January 22, when the first sparks of spring were already enkindled by the singing of a cardinal. We left Washington this January 21.

Excursions

Halle's praise of Washington opened with a description of Rock Creek that "wanders through the heart of Washington and remains uncorrupted."

Charmed by the virgin forests and the hidden river as described by Halle, I made a trip to the valley on January 10, and concluded that Halle was so lucky to be in Washington 65 years ago.

Instead of being lost in the murmur and rush of the creek, my ears were assailed by the noise of cars racing on a highway in the valley right next to the creek in the valley.

But I managed to capture some of Halle's feelings when I made a right turn and walked up a smaller creek that tumbled into Rock Creek and led to Dumbarton Oaks Park.

I did not visit the Zoological Gardens in the creek, as everybody else seemed to have done, and later found my decision justified by Halle's observations.

"The little shopkeeper on his Sunday outing would rather gaze upon the captured lion pacing behind bars than upon his unconquered brother of the wilderness, not only because he feels more secure but because he feels more important ... This world is never so much man's world as at the zoo," Halle writes.

'Improvements'

In his foreword, Peterson wrote of city planners who have forgotten the ideal of beauty and become obsessed with the "improvements," and his worry that "There have also been plans afoot to build a motor-road the length of the C and O [Chesapeake and Ohio] Canal, utilizing the bed of this old canal ... For the purpose of opening up the lands beyond the Appalachian mountains to settlement and trade."

John Quincy Adams and Theodore Roosevelt had all sung their praise of Rock Creek, but the influence of these figures apparently did little to save Halle's haunts -- which demonstrates the destructive power of capitalism.

Halle got around on a bicycle, on which he lavishes praise. "It is consonant with the independence of man because it works under his own power entirely. There is no combustion of some petroleum product from Venezuela to set the pedals going," Halle writes.

He prefer bicycles also because it is the nearest approximation to the flight of birds. Halle was a bird watcher. As a matter of fact, his predilection for bird watching earned him the reputation of being an escapist.

Underlying the beauty and the perceptions Halle evokes with words is evident his gloominess over the fact that "most of us have abandoned all desire to be free," much as a bird cowering in its cage when the door of the cage is lifted.

"We shall continue to sell our birthright for what we take to be the security of the hive until we have destroyed ourselves and it," he concludes.