As the height of the summer holiday season approaches in Britain, increasing demands are being made upon the railways in coping with the annual rush to the seaside. Because of the granting of holidays with pay to workers in many industries which hitherto did not offer this privilege, the summer passenger business of the four group railways promises to exceed all previous records. On the publicity side, an enormous amount of telling advertising matter has been put out, relating to train services and the varied attractions of the different resorts, and this year's official holiday handbooks have enjoyed record sales.

These holiday handbooks form, as it were, the backbone of Home railway passenger publicity. They are issued annually by the four main-line systems, and are priced at sixpence per copy. The current London, Midland and Scottish holiday guide consists of 976 pages. It describes more or less fully no fewer than six hundred resorts of all types scattered throughout the system, and includes over 7,000 addresses of hotels, boarding and apartment houses. The London and North Eastern Handbook, with its beautiful coloured cover from a design by Frank Newbold, is an equally comprehensive publication, covering all the East Coast resorts. It contains a complete list of hotels and other accommodation, with tariffs, and its value is greatly enhanced by the inclusion of twenty-one maps of different holiday districts, as well as many fine new pictures in photogravure. Pleasing holiday handbooks also are distributed by the Great Western and Southern lines. The former company's guide is divided into seven geographical sections. It contains about three hundred illustrations in sepia photogravure, seven hundred descriptions of Great Western resorts, and 8,000 holiday addresses.