Charity begins in Devon

Received a letter in the morning post from the National Trust. As a "valued local member", they are after a donation for their latest project.

Now this is the restoration and opening to the public of Greenway, Agatha Christie's house in Devon, and I thought at first, ooh, that would be great, I might even give them a fiver. And then I read down to the bit that says "With your gift of £25 or more today..."

Now my question is, would they not be better off leaving it up to the recipient to decide how much they want to give? Because I know I could still send off £5, and that that would be better than nothing - they could gas the woodworm in one windowsill or something. But I can't afford £25, so now I'm not inclined to send anything, and they've lost out completely.

£25, you start thinking, would be better off spent on digging wells in Africa or somesuch. It won't get there, of course. I'll end up spending it on chips. And maybe a second-hand Agatha Christie.