Fortunes Spent on Holidays.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXVI, Issue I, 5 January 1901, Page 20

Fortunes Spent on Holidays.

HEALTH RECRUITING AT £6,000 A WEEK.

Fifty thousand pounds for a single week’s holiday is rather a large sum, but this is the amount which the cotton workers of Blackburn have just laid out on their annual vacation. Tn all the Lancashire and Yorkshire towns clubs are formed by those who work in the large factories for the purpose of saving money in anticipation of seven days’ holiday in the summer, each person putting aside so much a week throughout the year. The money thus saved is. of course, banked by the club, and distributed when the time comes to each family in proportion to the amount saved by its various members. Last year a single family drew out from an Oldham club £74. and though at other times the recipients scarcely’ knew what luxury meant, they succeeded in spending the entire amount in one short week by the briny. This year the Oldham clubs are distributing £BO.OOO among their members, all of which will be swallowed up in seven davs’ diversion.

But these figures pale when compared to the fabulous prices expended by individual members of the aristocracy for a short holiday every’ year. A certain peer who annually hires one of the finest Scotch grouse moors openly stated the other day that the month of August necessitated his relieving his purse of £lOO,OOO every time it came round. This enormous sum is. of course, made up of several items, the most important being the cost of entertaining, the hire of the shooting, etc., while the cartridges

fired during this short period run up a bill of nearly £l5OO. Paradoxical as it may seem, it costs prominent members of society far less to spend a holiday in travelling abroad than in entertaining at their country seats at home. A month’s vacation for a party of six, spent in exploiing the Continent in the best style, will cost anything from £ 1000 to £ 5000, while a houseful of friends could not be entertained at home during the same period for less than the lastnamed sum, provided, of course, that sport was freely indulged in. To prove this, it is only necessary to state that considerably over two millions goes every year in the hire of shootings, and half that sum in obtaining the fishing rights of salmon and trout streams. Should the host possess pheasant coverts of his own. the cost will probably be even greater than it otherwise would, for rearing the birds necessitates his putting his hand in his pocket all the year round. IVhen Royalty takes a holiday vast sums of money are spent. The Queen’s few weeks on the Continent everv spring cost £30,000, but her recent visit to Ireland was even more expensive, and left little change out of £50.000.

The Kaiser assesses his usual visit to Cowes at £20.000, but then he spends a great deal of his time on the water, which considerably reduces the cost. Tn the olden days a Royal holiday in Britain was unreasonably expensive. for the visiting monarch was expected to leave never less than £5,000 in gratuities behind him. The late Prince Consort was responsible for many reforms in this respect, and a Royal visitor’s gratuity bill will now never exceed £ 2.000.

Eastern potentates when holidaymaking in Europe do so regardless of cost. The late Shah of Persia when be visited this country for the last time prior to his assassination was nolitelv informed that it was not the Queen’s wish that he should make his soionrn an expensive one. hut despite this he managed to part with £BO,OOO during his short stay. Another proHfie spender is Li Hung Chang, and his visit in 1896 eost him nearly £150,000. though the greater portion of this went in the substantial presents he gave to practically everybody he met. The most expensive holiday of this year is undoubtedly the Shah’s. During his recent visit to Europe he was recruiting his health at the cost of £6.000 a week!