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Show Unwanted Children Welcomed by Woman Styled World's Greatest Mother N. E. A. Staff Special. LONDON. "If nobody else wants thom, 1 want them' If nobody else loves them. I will love them. Bring them lu me a.nd I will give thom back to the world healthy nnJ useful. Babies Ba-bies are the nation's wealth. No baby, however born, wherever born, should bo noKlecicil " Thus says Lady Henry Somerset, whom the English call the "greatest mother in the world." Lady Henry has turned over her vast estates to her son. kept enough wealth to build herself a little sixteenth-century cottage at Du.xhurst, near Ilcigatc, amongst the Surrey Hills, a big nursery for the babies, i hospital lor the convelescent girl-mothers, some workshops, a pottery, u gen oral Btore, a wee postoffice and a chapel cha-pel which looks as If It had conic out of a medieval painting. LIVES FOR TOTS 'NOBODY WANTS' Here is where she lives and labors for the tiny creatures whom "nobody wants." She wears a uniform, this lady who might deck herBelf In velvets ami cloth-of-gold a severe gray habit with shorl cape and small bonnet. Its stiff lawn strings tied under the chin. The rigid plainness of her garb makes her face seem the more kindly a face In which intellect and a vast human sympathy blend. The old-fashioned and the new-fusli loned are happily mixed at Duxhurut. An old-world religious atmosphere is there, but with the old world harsh ness extracted. Duxhurst exists largely for girls who have made mistakes. But the old, pitiless piti-less punishmt n's are not meted. I Lady Henry Somerset's way Is different, dif-ferent, ft rat she restores the mother to physical strength Fof often she comes straight from the hospital. With j her 10-days-old babe, to the con vales cent home at Duxhurst. "The second step," says Lady Hen ry. "Is lo make the girl -who is often embittered by disappointment love her child This cannm be doni by severity. se-verity. She must apprecWe the grav-i grav-i Ity of her position, but she must bp given hope. MADE TO FEEL RESPONSIBILITY. "For her child's maintenance the iiiinln i must pay, in pari (say $1.50 to S2 a week). We try to defend her from tho terrible necessity of turning I to evil when deprived ii i h possibility possibil-ity of earning honestly n 1 .mg." Lady Henry calls Duxhurst "The Children's Village," since most of iij inhabitants are tots from ten days' old upwards. The mothers only slay for a period of convalescence Tho babies may grow up there If they like, leaving al the age of 18 with good hal!h and a gi.od working trade under their bonnets. Duxhurst was started by Lady Hen-l Hen-l ry Somerset 2n years ago as a refuge for women afflicted with alcoholism. IBut there was no hard and fast rule Neglected children were taken in. Girls who were first offenders In waywardness wayward-ness "Incorrigible" Inds. Anybody and everybody whom Lady Henry picked up when she searched London Lon-don slums and court rooms. W hen war came and iuu liquor traf fic was rigidly controlled, tbo "alco holies'' dwindled to almost nothing But the unwanted baby problem deepened. deep-ened. SCORE CAME THE FIRST DAY "So onu rudlant summer 'day In 1917 we opened our nursery for in-tants," in-tants," said Lady Henry. "The poor little mothers brought them and the Jl thai came thut day were a sorry sight. "The babies wulled, and tho moth ers cried. ... 1 was glad lo see how-much how-much some of them eared Many brought little bundles of fine-ly-slltched eioiln r.s thai they had made in the late hours after work, when no one was there to wonder or to question. ques-tion. 'Many of tin in show i'd m? letters from the boys who had gone away a lot of (hem honest boys killed at the iront before ihey could return and make things right "It Is a Constant Joy helping tho girls ;nd the babies." |