of the work; hence the Village Welfare Society, a new women's society founded in the year 1951. And what can a society of recent date, of scant experience and limited numbers, do with a problem as grave as the problem of the countryside?

The members of this institution visited a number of the villages of Lebanon and studied their social, cultural, and economic condition, and then set to work, taking upon themselves the raising of the countryside's level. But how to begin, and from where to begin? Should it confront ignorance first, or disease, or poverty? Which of these ills is the gravest in danger and the worst in consequence?

A sense of responsibility, then zeal and faith, set the helm of the work in motion; so we bore down upon ignorance to fight it, and upon poverty and disease to make war on them. From here we began, and our first aim was the education of woman, and then to turn to account the gifts and possibilities of the village by way of training in a trade, so as to forestall the drift to the city and raise the family's economic level. To carry out this aim, the society established three centers in three of the villages, addressing their problems.

1 - The first center is at Mounsef, a village in northern Lebanon, 45 kilometers from Beirut, lying to the northeast of the town of Jbeil. This center consists of a room next to the village school, in which the village women learn handwork — the weaving of bath rugs and household articles, and the elements of sewing — as well as learning to preserve dried figs in small bundles that are easy to sell. The figs of that region are famous for their excellence.

2 - The second center is in the village of Shatfin, in the Chouf district, about 60 kilometers from Beirut. This village has nothing

but a small, much-neglected ele-mentary school, and most of the village girls are illiterate; so the society began by fighting illiteracy and by teaching the village women the canning of vegetables and fruit, until some of them now can skillfully preserve the various vegetables that abound in their village — tomatoes, string beans, and carrots — and then to make compotes and jams, such as quince, fig, and others.

3 - The third center is in the village of Maarakeh, in southern Lebanon near the city of Tyre, about 115 kilometers from Beirut. When the society found that this village lacked most of the basic requisites of advancement, it began first by fighting the rampant illiteracy, and founded a small school for this purpose. This village has not yet specialized in a trade, for it is still in the stage of preparation.

Over and above what has been mentioned, the society exerts itself to secure the doctor and the nurse, and presents films, lectures, and health, agricultural, and social pamphlets at its various centers. And the society calls on certain societies, institutions, and individ-uals for help in accomplishing what is beyond its own power. The lecturers in the fields of health and agriculture are physi-cians and agricultural engineers who sacrifice their own time to help us in serving the countryside.

This is the greater part of the work of our society, the Village Welfare Society — the seed of a small work we began a few years ago, which has grown and devel-oped, so that we have come to bear its responsibilities more and more.

New organizations have today begun to take an interest in the countryside, and many efforts have begun to be made to

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