GIRL GUIDES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19474, 2 November 1926, Page 5

GIRL GUIDES.

The Girl Guides of the world recently held a conference in the United States of America and Sir Robert Baden Powell has been drawing attention to a recent development in the Boy Scout movement—the opening of an international hostel in the Swiss valley of Kandersteg,, says an exchange. This hostel ia not oniy a hoSiday meeting place lor lads from every clime and country; It is also intended na a centre of instruction for their officers and representatives of 15 different nations were recently in camp at Kandersteg for the purpose of learning the details of the scoutmaster's job. The growth of the Scout and Guide movement is a reminder of a certain beneficent fact which we in this industrially-minded age are too often inclined to ignore ; the fact that the ideathe living idear-~is independent of monetary backing ; and that education that ia real and sound needs very little aid from money. Prom Christianity to communism none of the ideas that have left their mark upon the world were ever financed into success, and, as the blood of its martyrs encourages an infant sect, so the absence of official recognition is often of very real advantage to a movement struggling to.to life. If the Boy Scout and Girl Guide movement had be«n recognised from the first by Government departments, supported out of rates and administered by public servants—if that had happened, does anyone suppose that it would have drawn into its influence young people all over the world? The war years wo old have killed such an organisation; but this healthy entity survived and flourished—because it was unhampered by official benison and guidance.