gamble. You can't say how much it will cost.
The only thing at all certain about it is that the
cost will be more than you can afford. Wherever
you go you become a goose to be plucked."

Let us rebel against this iniquity! It is not
a question of cheating, it is a trait of the national
character. In Great Britain, as among the Americans,
the gift of long sight in business has become
very common, and few persons think it worth their
while to see the practical good things within easy
reach of the blessed short sight of common sense.
Our chief aim is not to keep a market open and
steady, but to glut it with over-production or
to block it with excessive prices. "Here is a
holiday-tripper, so let us make him pay!" That seems
to be the unconquerable maxim at all seaside resorts
and in every place where tired workers seek rest
and health. I have known a week's holiday in
the New Forest to cost as much as a tour of three
weeks in the beautiful and bracing Ardennes.
The Belgian is content to draw his customers back
to him, while the Englishman grasps all he can get
and sends us away discontented.

It is true that the railway companies are doing
all in their power to make holidays at home welcome
and inexpensive. Their enterprise in this respect
has no limits. But we cannot live on cheap railway
tickets alone, whether single or return. Something
should be done--and the newspapers could help--to
establish in all attractive districts a reasonable
tariff for board and lodging. It is only thus that
Great Britain will be made popular during the
holiday season, and that the great stream of gold--the
holiday-making Pactolus--will be drawn
from the Continent to nourish our own country
sides and rural folk.

It seems to be certain that, during the reign
of the old stage coach, life in rustic England was
cheaper than it is to-day. At any rate we must
account in some way or other for the immense
number of county histories and illustrated
topographical books which teemed from the press from
the middle of the eighteenth century to the time
of J. M. W. Turner. To study these works is to
be sure that our forefathers took the greatest
delight in their own country, and that huge sums
of money were spent in procuring fine sketches and
adequate engravings. Side by side with these
books on British topography were volumes on
foreign travel, like those by William Alexander,
who in 1792 accompanied Lord Macartney's
embassy to China,