THE BRITISH EMPIRE EXHIBITION : A DOMESTIC SUGGESTION. T HE Committee
of the British Empire Exhibition seem to intend not only to attract visitors to their show, but to take real, even imaginative, care of their comfort when they get there. For instance, there is to be bathing in a wide, tree-bordered lake. Not merely aquatic sports, but pleasure bathing, with rafts, chutes and little canoes for the unathletic. Weakness of the flesh on the part of the sightseer is, of course, the bane of a visit to most exhibitions. Who does not know the feeling of backache and foot-weariness ? This trouble is to be met in an amusing and enterprising way ; there are to be moving platforms, one travelling at ten, another at five, another at two and.a-half miles an hour, on which one may stand or sit, and so be taken a complete circuit of the Exhibition grounds.
But we should like to suggest one other arrangement for the comfort of visitors. Why should not the Exhibition authorities arrange a crèche, where the smaller children of family parties could be left while the others make the grand tour ? Not a stuffy tent, not a sort of glorified cloakroom, but a pleasant little pavilion with its own garden, where there would be toys to play with and nurses to look after the children. It is miserable to take a baby or " toddler " on such an afternoon's pleasuring. But if both parents go, in the case of many young couples the unfortunate, and probably very heavy, child hai to be taken the whole round of a crowded exhibitimi. Parents and child are exhausted by such a day's "pleasure," and everything is seen by the parents through a mist of the baby's needs.
Yet we are always being told that these parents are the Empire's best citizens. Surely, then, they especially deserve to see this particular Exhibition in comfort. We suggest that there should be two grades of crèche—a cheap one and a comparatively expensive one. In the expensive one the most hygienic- ally -anxious (fussy if you will) sort of mother would be catered for. There are many mothers who now- adays do not employ a nurse and who, having been, say, teachers, trained nurses, or health visitors, set a higher hygienic standard than does the rich woman's Nannie, and demand " the very best." A higher price would automatically exclude children from whom such a mother would fear infection. In the " A " model nursery every sort of hygienic precaution could be taken. The toys and apparatus used would, we suggest, be the property of various makers of special nursery furnishings, for toy manufacturers and patent food makers could here show their wares to their own selected public to the greatest possible advantage. Indeed, if 'the model were well run, mothers would come to the Exhibition to see the latest things in nursery equipment.
It would, perhaps, be even possible to induce some great national institution such as the Red Cross to provide the necessary staff from the more experienced members of their Voluntary Aid Detachments. This should prove a double blessing. It would help to make the Red Cross and its new peace work better known in the Dominions and in Great Britain, and should afford aid and comfort to the visitors at the Exhibition.
According to the time of day and the weather the children would either play in the special garden attached (where there would be such things as buckets and spades and a sand heap) or be given their tea or " put down " to have their rests. Probably the best arrangement would be to divide the little visitors into nursery, parties, so many children to each nurse. The child would thus, instead of a day of tiring " dragging about," enjoy a pleasant variation of its usual routine. In " B," the less expensive nursery, there would be the same sort of playground and similar sand heaps, but the general fitting- up might be plainer, and the attendants might be either the sort of motherly body who keeps an eye on the children in some of the playing grounds of our parks or young 'prentice Nannies under one experienced head.
We suggest that all the industries that have to do with the welfare of children whose goods could not be used in the crèche—pram makers, publishers of picture books and of text-books relating to the care of children, makers of tropical nursery equipment—should have their exhibits close to the numerics. The difficulty to the layman would be that of guessing how many children would have to be provided for and how to deal with a Bank holiday. But just such calculations are, one supposes, the business of the promoters of exhibitions. We believe that if the British Empire Exhibition Com- mittee adopted some such scheme they would find that they had earned much gratitude from parents.
Might it not be possible also to exchange nursery ideas with the various Dominions ? Perhaps Canadian or Australian mothers have cunning ways that are unknown to us. Did not Dr. Truby King's method come to us from New Zealand ? Or we might hear of new ideas when travelling with children by train or ship.!,
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