In Milan an agitation for the provision of meals was set on foot in the last decade of the nineteenth century. The municipal authority declined to undertake the work themselves, but advocated the formation of charitable committees to raise subscriptions for the purpose, offering to supplement these voluntary funds with a municipal subvention. This grant amounted in 1897 to about L400.[610] It was soon found that this system did not work satisfactorily, and the municipality was obliged, though somewhat reluctantly, to assume the responsibility.[611] Footnote 610: Minutes of London School Board, May 26, 1898, Vol. 48, p. 1810. Footnote 611: _Lancet_ Reports, 1907, p. 20. But it is in the small rural town of Vercelli that we find the most remarkable experiment.[612] Here for some years a charitable committee had been providing meals for children who lived too far from school to go home at mid-day, and the municipality had granted a small subsidy, but it was felt that this provision was entirely inadequate. In 1900 it was decided to provide a meal for all the children attending the elementary schools. The object was not the relief of distress but education in its fullest sense, as distinct from mere instruction. It was argued that the mid-day recess furnished an opportunity for moral education which could not be imparted in the class-room. The teachers would be brought into more intimate relation with the children, while the joining of richer and poorer alike in the common meal and in recreation afterwards would instil sentiments of brotherhood. The meal was to be free to all and attendance compulsory, for rich and poor were to be treated exactly alike. With the same object of preventing class distinctions, clothes were supplied for the poorer children, the municipality providing the material which was worked into garments by the sewing classes. The teachers were to have the same food, though they were allowed a double quantity, and were to eat it with the children. For this extra duty of supervising both the meals and recreation they only received an additional L2 a year. Since the moral rather than the physical welfare of the child was the primary consideration, too little attention was paid to the actual food that was given. The parents, it was argued, could in the great majority of cases amply feed their children at home, hence all that was needed was to supply sufficient food to compensate for the waste of energy during the two and a half hours of morning school. A cold meal of bread and sausage or cheese was given. This did not satisfy the more prosperous children, who would have preferred to pay for a hot meal, and some 10 per cent. of the children, chiefly the richer ones, obtained a medical certificate exempting them from attendance. Nor was the meal sufficient for the poorest children who were suffering from lack of food. To provide a really adequate meal free for all would have been too expensive an undertaking. Accordingly,