the doctor, too, we should stand ready to change our plan of treatment when conditions change. "In one family, where a pension was given on account of the breadwinner's illness, and continued for six weeks after his death, the daughters have been unwilling to take work offered at wages they thought too low, because they were not thrown upon their own resources at once." [3] A plan that is not based upon the actual facts is, of course, worse than useless. Sometimes a charitable person will call at a home for the first time, will see miserable surroundings, and will feel that the circumstances are all made plain to him in one visit. Calling at a relief office, he will urge immediate relief, adding, "I have investigated the case myself." {156} The word "investigation" means very different things to different people. Here are some of the questions that, according to the London "Charity Organization Review," [4] an almoner should ask himself about any given case: "1. Can anything be done to increase the family income? Can the number of wage-earners be added to? Can those doing badly paid work be taught better-paid work? Can they be put in the way of getting better tools or appliances? "2. Can anything be done to make the existing income go farther than it goes now? e.g. "(_a_) Is too much money paid away in rent? Could as good accommodations be obtained in the district elsewhere for less? Or could the family do with less accommodation. "(_b_) Is money wasted? _e.g._ on medicine, or in habitual pawning, or in purchasing from tallymen, or in buying things not wanted? Do husband and children keep back an undue share of their earnings? "(_c_) Is too much money spent in travelling {157} backwards and forwards to place of employment? If so, could the family move nearer to their work without increasing their rent? "These are but a few of the questions which the almoner must put if he wishes to be thorough. In every case he must _think_ about the problem with which he is dealing, and he must try to make those who are applying for help think also." The best arguments for giving relief upon a definite plan are the results of haphazard benevolence that are all around us--feeble-minded women with illegitimate offspring, children crippled by drunken fathers, juvenile offenders who began as child-beggars, aged parents neglected by their children. Every form of human weakness and depravity is intensified by the charity that asks no questions. _The third relief principle is that relief should look not only to the alleviation of present suffering, but to promoting the future welfare of the recipient._ IV. It follows from the foregoing that when we relieve at all we should relieve adequately.