Materfamilias on Tramp.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 879, 4 January 1889, Page 4

Materfamilias on Tramp.

A LONDON LADY WHO WALKED 500 MILES WITH HER FAMILY AND PERAMBULATOR. As we reported some time ago, Mrs Action, of Sunnyside, St John’s Wood, and Ormidale, Arran, is the heroine of the latest pedestrian feat—a walk of 500 miles in England and Scotland, beginning at London and ending in Glasgow, and performed, not alone, but in the company of her whole family of six ohild. ren, the eldest of whom is twelve years and the youngest twelve months. A representative of the Pall Mall Gazette, a day or two ago, waited upon Mrs Acton at Brodick to obtain particulars of her remarkable walk. * But you must bear in mind that we had no idea when we started of doing anything very wonderful in walking. We come np from London every year to our house here in Arran ; and as we went down by rail no less than nine times last year, we thought we would walk this year and see the country, for of oourse you can never see anything of it from the windows of a railway carriage.’ A PARTY OF TEN HOW THEY FARED. * To begin with, of whom did your party consist ?’— ‘ There were the six children, the youngest in our famous perambulator, which has been, oh ! thousands of miles on the Continent and in England and in Scotland ; and my husband and myself, and two maids—ten in all.’ ‘What was your outfit?’—‘When we started from Sunnyside, our house in. St John’s Wood, wo each took a small blaok bag in our hands ; but we soon had to give those up. Afterwards we had absolutely nothing but a nightgown and a mackintosh eaoh. There was one brush and one comb for myself and all the children. We really couldn’t carry more than the least possible quantity of luggage, you know. Tea—my husband ip, so fond of a good oup of tea,—so we oarried our tea all the way from London ; and we had a kettle too, one of those flat ones to boil over a spirit lamp, and the spirit lamp itself. And of course the baby, being a young baby and fed on the bottle, obliged us to carry a tin can of milk.’ ‘ How did you manage ? And, by the way, what was your fare?'—‘We had very light fare. As soon as we got into the North of England we always had porridge for breakfast. We never had much meat; on the only two occasions when we had a really good dinner we found we could not walk afterwards. We had eggs, and milk, and bread and butter to any amount. The meat we had was almost entirely tinned meat, which we bought, with bread, in the town or village in the morning, and ca ried with us till we came to a suitable place for dinner. We had dinner in the open air always. Then for tea we had just to call at a cottage and get a kettle of water and the use of tea. things, which they were always gla.d to supply ns with for a shilling.’ BOOTS AND WASHING. ‘ Of course the trouble was boots,’ Mrs Acton continued. ‘We were recommended all sorts of ‘ hygienic soles ’ and everything, and we tried everything, and we had to give them all up. We gave up boots altogether and took to “ sand shoes ” —canvas shoes with india-rubber soles. We never got blisters or sore feet or anything. We ÜBed to soap our toes and heels and the insidles of our stockings before we started. Then as to washing, we could not possibly stop to have everything washed at the inns and places, so the way we managed our washing was to have one thing washed each night,' NO UMBRELLAS. ‘ We carried no umbrellas. A City man, a neighbor of ours in London, asked ms before we started, * * How many umbrellas are you

going to take ?” and when I replied, “Not one,” he was perfectly horrified; it made him quite ill. But though the weather was very bad in England, we did very well without* In tha first part of the time we walked in our mackintoshes; and hats that the rahi would not hurt. Of course, it was very mliddy j and what with the mud and tha rain and the sun, oilr dress got into such a state we were quite ashamed of ourselves ; and on Saturday nights we had to stop somewhere and buy flowers or some little frilling or something to brighten up our hats to go to church in next morning. But we never had colds, in spite of having no umbrellas, and though we had a great deal of grey cold weather that people complained of, we found it splendid weather for walking.’ ‘ What was your plan of walking ?’—“ We made it a rule to start by half-past seven, after bieakfast. We walked a few hours and then rested during the heat of the day, and walked again in the afternoon* Having so many children with us the anxiety was t;o get into some place for stopping at before dark—by six. if possible; but never later than seven. Sometimes we had great difficulty in getting accommodated —atßolper.for instance. Sometimes we had the roughest lodgings, and sometimes we were in the most splendid hotels. We just took what we could find, in fact.’ RECEPTION BY THE WAY.' ‘ Had you no incivility on the way ?’— ‘ None whatever. We were told to expect all sorts of mischief from tramps on the highways, so wo carried a sword-Btick, and my husband had a pistol. Of course, your friends frighten you as much as they can—and it is quite right, too, to be on the safe side. But there was not an idea of either pistol or sword-atiok being wanted. And as to civility, one thing very much impressed upon me toy the last part of our walk was the great softening of manners that has taken place among the Scotch lower classes as compared with the roughness and abruptness I remember noticing among them twenty years ago.’ At the end of the conversation Mrs Acton assured her interlocutor that the children and herself had alike enjoyed their long walk immensely, and, so far from taking harm from it, had felt better in health and spirits while the journey lasted, and at its end, than they had ever felt before—a statement to which the personal appearance of the lady and the little ones gave full corroboration. The same evening our zepresentativfc met the whole party, perambulator and all, five miles from Bridick, on the shore road to Corrie, taking a twelve-ihile walk us a little evening recreation !