INTRODUCTION 19 group of garrulous women -- the cleaning staff. This is perhaps the first change that former boys and girls returning to the village for a visit would notice. It is years since the children were expected to do the cleaning around the cottages which were their homes. Nor do they crawl into cold beds in unheated rooms; central heating was installed a number of years ago. There are other changes: mischievous children are no longer punished with a strap and the meals are the responsibility of individual cottage parents and vary with each unit. Former boys and girls recall the regulation 'orphanage' meals of porridge for breakfast, soup or stew at most other meals. To facilitate my research a desk was provided in the administration building which had been the Quarrier family residence. In the hall a large photograph of the founder keeps a stern eye on the activities of the staff. On the desk in the director's office (formerly the Quarrier bedroom) rests a small boot. It was fashioned by Quarrier's own hand when he was a shoe apprentice. It is made from stiff leather, the sole well fortified with hob nails, symbolizing the kind of Scottish durability Quarrier sought to instil in the children. Woe betide the small foot that dared to stray from the path Mr Quarrier's boot set for it. In Canada, most of the old distributing Homes have been demolished, leaving no trace of the children who came to them. In Peterborough, Ontario, a corner sign 'Barnardo Avenue' recalls the days when Hazel Brae, the Barnardo Home for Girls, stood near it. The story is the same at Niagara-on-the-Lake where, in 1869, Miss Rye took over and renovated the former court-house and jail building for 'Our Western Home'. It too has been torn down, but the street signs 'Rye' and 'Cottage' remind us that thousands of little girls once walked in orderly rows from that corner to St Mark's Anglican Church every Sunday. Marchmont Home, the third building in Belleville to carry the name, is still standing. Fairknowe, the Quarrier Home in Brockville, is one of the few old Homes still in use. It has been converted to an apartment A .1 <n X