HOMECROFT SETTLEMENT FUND
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.]
SIR, —I have spoken of possibilities always, hitherto, in connexion with our Homecroft Settlement Scheme at Cheltenham. I think I may almost speak of certainties now. It is not certain yet that there is going to be the particular eighteen or twenty acres of land covered with Homecrofts that we want. But I think everybody may assume now that there is going to be something ; this land or some land, forty Homecrofts or four. I think I may say this although we have had a nasty knock this week in the midst of our success. It came by the very post which brought in the Spectator with the magnificent record reached last week by the Fund. It was the Development Commissioners' regretful refusal to stand in with the substantial contribution we had hoped for. It troubled them. Their refusal was couched in the kindest letter I have seen from a Government Department. And only the advent of what one of my friends calls our " four-figure " man will quite repair the breach. I shall never cease to believe that that man exists. If we don't meet him now, some Mends of ours will meet some friends of his, somewhere in the far future ! For this thing is bound to come—the wage-earning city working man, coming home in the evening, or rather, in the still young after- noon, to *his own little cottage and his own little freehold, there to finish his day in pleasanter work than he has just left behind him, helping wife and children and they helping him to take their own food from their own soil by their own labour. We want to begin the investigation of how it is done. And we are beginning. We propose, after three years' payments, to convey their Homecrofts to the men who make good in them, under a mortgage agreement. We are aware of the difficulties which lurk there, particularly that conveyed in Mary, Lady Lovelace's letter last week, which we had antici- pated and which we think we see our way through, though we should be grateful to anyone who might care to put the teaching of special experience at our disposal. A prospectus is in active contemplation, although it is a biggish under- taking and will scarcely be ready before we must desist from using the Spectator's space. But I believe if this were once printed and ready to show to business men, the breach left by the Development Commissioners would be quickly healed. I should be glad of any inquiries.—I am, Sir, &c., We have to acknowledge this week £50 from Miss A. Blyth ; £5 each from J. M. H., the Rev. C. R. Shaw Stewart, and Anon. ; £1 1s., Mrs. G. H. Pollard and Anon. ; and promises of £5 from Miss L. Poste, £1 J. E. Pennington, making a total of £1,078 16s., of which £252 16s. has been paid in cash to the " Spectator Homecroft Fund " at Barclays Bank, Goslings' Branch.—En. Spectator.]
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