[48] These exceptions are certain of the lower class hotels where attempts along this line seem to fail. [49] See "How the Other Half Lives," Ch. VIII. See also "Social Relief Work of the S. A.," p. 10. [50] See examples given at the end of this chapter, p. 77. [51] See the tables, pp. 97 and 98, showing percentages of these men who had come from the country. For the work of Mr. Fox see p. 113. [52] See examples of these men, p. 77 fl. [53] See Giddings' "Principles of Sociology," p. 127. [54] Some light may be thrown on this subject by a perusal of Mr. W. H. Dawson's book entitled "The German Workman," although conditions are evidently vastly different in this country and England from what they are in Germany. [55] See examples numbered 4. 5. 9. 23 and others, on p. 78 and fl. [56] While this percentage is larger than that in the Industrial Homes (see p. 62), 62 per cent. of the examples in the Hotels having regular trades were dissipated, mostly victims of drink, as against 19 per cent. in the Industrial examples. CHAPTER III. THE FARM COLONIES OF THE SALVATION ARMY. So many times has the cry been raised "back to the land!", so optimistic have so many reformers become over the hope that the population could be diverted from the city to the country, and so loudly have certain enthusiasts prophesied a surely successful issue to colonizing enterprises, that the Salvation Army colonies form a very interesting and profitable field of investigation. What is needed is an experiment that will prove or disprove the prophesied success of taking the people back to the land. Once that is proved, with the great Northwest of America almost untouched, with immense tracts of good land in Africa and other continents, and with the United States about to open up millions of acres of land, made fertile by means of irrigation, we shall be ready to act and get rid of the surplus city population. But first we must have the proof, and the question before us is whether the Salvation Army has sufficiently proved the case. The matter was agitated before the English Government to such an extent in 1905 that the Rhodes Trustees, contributing sufficient funds to cover the expense, the Secretary of State for the Colonies nominated Mr. Rider Haggard, the novelist, to visit the United States and inspect the three Salvation Army colonies there, to make a report on the same, and to include in this report any practical suggestions which might occur to him. The following words were used in the letter of commission: "It appears to the Secretary of State that if these experiments are found to be successful, some analogous system might to great advantage be applied in transferring the urban population of the United Kingdom to different parts of the United Kingdom."[57]