Section S.— WHITECHAPEL-BY-THE-SEA.

In considering the various means by which some substantial improvement can be made in the condition of the toiling masses, recreation cannot be omitted. I have repeatedly had forced upon me the desirability of making it possible for them to spend a few hours occasionally by the seaside, or even at times three or four days. Notwithstanding the cheapened rates and frequent excursions, there are multitudes of the poor who, year in and out, never get beyond the crowded city, with the exception of dragging themselves and their children now and then to the parks on holidays or hot summer evenings. The majority, especially the inhabitants of the East of London, never get away from the sunless alleys and grimy streets in which they exist from year to year. It is true that a few here and there of the adult population, and a good many of the children, have a sort of annual charity excursion to Epping Forest, Hampton Court, or perhaps to the sea. But it is only the minority, The vast number, while possessed of a passionate love of the sea, which only those who have mixed with them can conceive, pass their whole lives without having once looked over its blue waters, or watched its waves breaking at their feet.

Now I am not so foolish as to dream that it is possible to make any such change in Society as will enable the poor man to take his wife and children for a fortnight's sojourn, during the oppressive summer days, to brace them up for their winter's task, although this might be as desirable in their case as in that of their more highly favoured fellow-creatures. But I would make it possible for every man, woman and. child, to get, now and then, a day's refreshing change by a visit to that never-failing source of interest.

In the carrying out of this plan, we are met at the onset with a difficulty of some little magnitude, and that is the necessity of a