IRature IRotes : 
tEbe Selbovne Society’s ilDagasine. 
No. 92. AUGUST, 1897. VoL. VIII. 
THE CHILDREN’S COUNTRY HOLIDAYS FUND. 
;E have more than once appealed to Selbornians to take 
part in the excellent work by means of which some 
slight knowledge of those charms of Nature which they 
themselves so much appreciate is brought to those who 
are less fortunate in their opportunities. Ten shillings is suffi- 
cient to ensure a week’s holiday in the country for a child. 
There must be many of our readers who could give that sum 
without difficulty, and who spend much more than ten times 
that amount on their own annual holiday. Will they not in- 
crease their own happiness by making others happy ? Last year 
30,000 London children were sent away through the help of 
this fund ; this year subscribers are fewer and subscriptions 
smaller. 
The following extracts from the interesting Report on 
Country Holiday work, which Miss Margaret Sewell has edited 
for the fund, will show how much need there is among town 
children for education of the kind which a country holiday gives : 
To most of the children the country in itself is sufficient to make a holiday ; 
plenty to eat, fields to play in, and a shallow stream where you can wade and try 
to catch fish with your fingers if you have no rod, are delights enough to fill up a 
fortnight quite happily. No definite teaching of any kind has been organised. 
There is no lack of instruction for the children furnished daily and hourly by the 
commonest objects around them, and they are so keen to observe and to know, 
that they are not slow to ask for an explanation that may open up whole new 
worlds of knowledge and reflection for them. For instance, that water was to be 
found underground and could be brought up for use by such a strange-looking 
thing as a pump in a garden, was a matter of the greatest wonder and admiration 
to two intelligent little boys who only knew before of its existence in taps and the 
river Thames ; and the same boys came home from a walk full of wonder at 
having discovered in a farmyard “ houses built of straw with no door or 
windows,” and “ birds carrying something white underneath them,” the clean 
white breasts of the martins bearing in their minds no likeness to the smoky 
