第100章 ASSISTANCE IN GENERAL.(13)

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 vastly reduced charge in the cost of the journey.To do anything effective we must be able to get a man from Whitechapel or Stratford to the sea-side and back for a shilling.

Unfortunately,London is sixty miles from the sea.Suppose we take it at seventy miles.This would involve a journey of one hundred and forty miles for the small sum of 1s.Can this be done?I think it can,and done to pay the railway companies;otherwise there is no ground to hope for this part of my Scheme ever being realised.But I think that this great boon can be granted to the poor people without the dividends being sensibly affected.I am told that the cost of haulage for an ordinary passenger train,carrying from five hundred to a thousand persons,is 2s.7d.per mile;a railway company could take six hundred passengers seventy miles there,and bring them seventy miles back,at a cost of #181s.8d.Six hundred passengers at a shilling is #30,so that there would be a clear profit to the company of nearly #12on the haulage,towards the payment of interest on the capital,wear and tear of line,&c.But I reckon,at a very moderate computation,that two hundred thousand persons would travel to and fro every season.

An addition of #10,000to the exchequer of a railway company is not to be despised and this would be a mere bagatelle to the indirect profits which would follow the establishment of a settlement which must in due course necessarily become very speedily a large and active community.

This it would be necessary to bring home to the railway companies,and for the execution of this part of my Scheme I must wait till I get some manager sufficiently public-spirited to try the experiment.When such a man is found,I purpose to set at once about my Sea-Side Establishment.

This will present the following special advantages,which I am quite certain will be duly appreciated by the very poorest of the London population:--An estate of some three hundred acres would be purchased on which buildings would be erected,calculated to meet the wants of this class of excursionists.

Refreshments would be provided at rates very similar to those charged at our London Food Depots.There would,of course,be greater facilities in the way of rooms and accommodation generally.

Lodgings for invalids,children,and those requiring to make a short stay in the place would be supplied at the lowest prices.Beds for single men and single women could be charged at the low rate of sixpence a night,and children in proportion,while accommodation of a suitable character,on very moderate terms,could be arranged for married people.

No public-houses would be allowed within the precincts of the settlement.