the turn-over at Rochdale is enormous, and the profits amount to thousands of pounds annually. The Pioneers possess nearly a street of shops, also cottages, corn-mills, and cotton-mills.

Having a sound commercial basis, co-operation steadily advanced, and other towns opened stores upon the Rochdale model. The invaluable help freely given to young societies by the Pioneers, entitles them to the lasting gratitude of co-operators.

The origin of a co-operative store is somewhat as follows :-A few thoughtful men resolve to co-operate, or club their money and services for mutual benefit. They subscribe a few pence per week, canvass their shopmates and neighbours, some of whom contribute, but others shake their heads. Distrust is the first obstacle to cooperation. Having raised enough capital, and registered the rules under the Industrial and Provident Societies New Act, with limited liability, a shop is opened for the sale of food. Customers are ready in the families of perhaps a hundred members. There is no "goodwill" to be bought, and no money need be spent upon puffing advertisements, or plate glass. With honesty and good management -ay, there's the rub!-trade grows, profits increase, and capital accumulates. Probably in twelve months a branch store is opened; and presently the members build a substantial and spacious central store, with the addition of a large room for meetings, recreation, and instruction. The opening of such a building is a red letter day in the co-operator's calendar.

Co-operative societies are invariably and entirely managed by the members; they have nothing to do with patronage. This is a principal cause of their endurance and prosperity. Another conserving element is their singleness of purpose. No ulterior object, political or religious, is permitted to divert attention, and thwart the realization of the desired object by introducing discord and division. Nothing in the oc-operative movement wins, my admiration more than the quiet, honest, persistent, earnest, and efficient labours of the governing bodies of these societies.

A distinctive feature of co-operative trade lies in the system of apportioning profits. Five per cent. having been awarded as interest upon capital, due allowance made for depreciation of fixed stock, &c., a bonus of one to two shillings in the £. is given upon purchases; and even non-members share this bonus, according to the extent of their purchases. This is both just and politic, and the principle invariably works beneficially and profitably. The plan pursued is to give small tin checks or tokens to each customer, stamped with the amount of his purchase. These checks are sent to the store at the quarter's end, when the dividend or bonus is paid, and those customers receive most who have spent most. The largest buyers are those with the largest families; consequently those receive most who need most, or, in Lancashire phrase, "the more they eaten the more they geten." The bonus can be drawn, or it may be left to accumulate with interest. In this way the poorest person may save in what he spends, and literally eat himself into a

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capitalist. Who first hit upon this happy and profitable plan of sharing profits is not certainly known, for more than one co-operator is credited with the discovery.

Co-operative stores are a great success; they pay well. Investment therein is profitable, yet the limit placed on investment precludes monopoly. No wonder that the profits are good, with a brisk ready money trade, and moderate expenses; for there is no waste of gas and goods, to make a tempting show. To make money, however, is not the only object of co-operation. One desire of workmen in thus uniting is, doubtless, to make their limited means go farther. There is also a laudable desire to be saving, and a determination to emancipate themselves from debt and poverty. Cooperation enables the workman to add the profits of trade to the wages of labour; and no one will question his right to do this. He thereby learns to estimate duly the influence and importance of capital, and may be said to be building a bridge over the frightful chasm between capital and labour.

Co-operation does more than this-for it helps those who cannot help themselves. Picture a labourer with five in family: every penny is needed for food. How he pays rent, clothes and schools his children, is a marvel; it is certain that he cannot save anything, and he is probably distracted with debt. There are millions of hard working Englishmen thus bordering upon pauperism. Let such men become co-operators, and they may save in what they spend. This is the only movement that ensures to the industrious class a certainty of improving their income without increasing their labour. The people want less work, more play, and better pay. Long hours and exhausting toil have a brutalising influence. Co-operation has a blessed effect in mitigating these evils; while the happiest results are flowing from its refreshing streams of social intercourse, and the facilities afforded for education and amusement. Every man who desires to be better off, should join a co-operative store. The payment of one shilling makes a man a member, and entitles him to a copy of the rules, and full dividend. The shares are £1 each, to be paid up at not less than 3d. a-week. Moderate dealings at a store will therefore yield enough to enable a person to take up and pay several shares, and put something into his pocket besides. Another motive for co-operating is to obtain pure food; in fact, the first stores were started to check monopoly and adulteration. of the many evils of competitive trade lies in the temptation to trickery. The interest of the seller is not the interest of the buyer. A strong recommendation therefore of the co-operative system is the absence of this temptation. A child is as well served at a co-operative store as an adult customer.

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The central and sustaining pillar of the co-operative structure is the principle of "No Trust." This rigid rule may seem hard, but it is true kindness. The credit system is a curse to buyer and seller; it tempts the customer to run up a score-and only the debtor knows the misery of being in debt: moreover, the honest customers pay for

the defaulters, or else the poor shopkeeper suffers. In short, the tally system breeds improvidence and duplicity; while ready-money trading nurtures economy and honesty.

There is a feature in the Prestwich society, near Manchester, that is worthy of imitation, namely, a fund for the relief of honest debtors, who are, as they expressly term it, "fast" with a shop score. A member becomes guarantee in each case of loan, so that the society incurs no risk, and the debt being paid, the emancipated person joins the co-operative society, and repays the loan from his profits. Many poor persons have been thus aided, and not a shilling has been lost.

The Parliamentary Returns relating to co-operative societies, gathered by Mr. Tidd Pratt, are of extraordinary interest. These returns can be bought of Hansard for 6d. The returns relate to 332 co-operative societies, and their receipts for goods in 1862, were £2,331,650, yielding a profit of £165,770. The members numbered above 90,000, and the subscribed capital was £425,315. 98 of these societies in Lancashire drew out, in that distressful year, £134,873, and the leading societies subscribed largely to the Relief Fund. The pressure of the cotton distress in any locality has been in inverse ratio to the spread of co-operation. This must be regarded as a very hopeful fact. The total number of societies registered by Mr. Tidd Pratt at his last advice, was 521; this was for England and Wales only. The Scottish Registrar has not yet prepared the returns for Scotland. There are altogether probably nearly a thousand co-operative societies, with a capital of over a million, and 200.000 members, while every day witnesses an increase.

That co-operation is applicable to agricultural districts has been proved in many instances, particularly at the co-operative farms in Suffolk. Co-operation has also been applied extensively to manufacturing purposes, including cotton spinning and weaving, quilt making, shoemaking, hat making, tailoring, &c. The law precludes from banking and mining; and there is one trade from which the societies conscientiously abstain, and that is brewing. There is only a solitary instance of a co-operative society selling beer; and as a rule no meetings are held at public-houses. One of the noblest features of the movement, the educational, I reluctantly pass over; and in conclusion, must deplore the existence of two terrible obstacles to the progress of this and every upward movement-and which are both the causes and consequences of poverty-the licensed drinktraps, and the tobacco-pipe.

The Edinburgh Co-operative Building Company. By H. G. REID.

ABOUT forty years ago a co-operative society, the first in Scotland, was formed in Edinburgh for the purpose of supplying provisions. New to the people, condemned by those interested in maintaining monopoly, and under the management of men who had caught an

idea but knew not how to carry it into practice, the society soon languished and died. The wild Utopia" fell into disrepute. From the character of its first promoters, and the apparent equality it assumed, co-operation was denounced as socialistic, revolutionary, and dangerous. The principle was not, however, doomed to extermination; it possessed the elements of life, and taken up by another and more practical class of men, it re-appeared in new forms and under more hopeful auspices.

The most important step in the history of co-operation in Scotland is the formation of the Edinburgh Co-operative Building Company, the origin and progress of which are alike note-worthy.

The unfortunate trade dispute of 1861-2, which formed a subject of discussion at the last two meetings of this Association, brought the working men of Edinburgh more in contact with each other, and taught them the necessity and the power of union. When that dispute was virtually terminated, a few workmen determined to make some effort to prevent such unseemly contentions, and otherwise benefit the class to which they belonged. For some time the question of co-operation had been much discussed; the example of Rochdale and other English towns had been held up for imitation ; and the industrial classes urged to take immediate action. The defective house accommodation of Edinburgh, and the wretched condition to which thousands were consequently reduced, formed at once an argument and a stimulus. For many years the want had been felt, and a process at work was rapidly intensifying the evil. Large numbers of houses, many of them suitable enough for working men and their families, were swept away by the building of new streets, and other improvements-all very good in themselves had provision been made for those whose dwelling-place was removed. While the demand for accommodation was increasing, the number of houses was being steadily diminished. The natural result was, that houses already overcrowded were still further subdivided; rooms, small enough before, were partitioned, often in the flimsiest and most unsatisfactory way; and our "lands" became more like rabbit warrens in their accommodation and density of population, than the abodes of human beings. Crowded together, destitute of water and soil-pipes, of ventilation, and almost of light, the influence of such dwellings on the inhabitants could only be physical and moral degradation.

We mention these facts to show the need that existed, and that still exists, for additional and better house accommodation, and because, out of this humiliating and much-to-be-deplored state of matters rose the Edinburgh Co-operative Building Company. Six or eight earnest though humble men had set to work; and with a nominal capital of £10,000, divided into shares of £1 each, the company was registered under the Limited Liability Act, on the 25th of May, 1861. The number of shareholders at that time was 70, and the shares taken up, 160. After considerable delay and trouble, a piece of ground, suitable for building, was found. One

acre was feued at Stockbridge-a half rural situation-and very speedily forty houses were erected upon it. The building is two stories, and the houses are self-contained-each family having a separate door. The ground floor enters from the front, and the upper from an outside stair at the back. The accommodation isparlour, 13 ft. by 12 ft.; kitchen, 12 ft. by 10 ft.; bedroom, 8 ft. 6 in. by 6 ft. 6 in.; with watercloset and coal-cellar. Each house has a plot of ground 20 ft. by 17 ft. attached, besides the use of a common bleaching green. The houses on the ground floor sold at £130; those on the upper (having two additional bedrooms in the attics) at £150, making the entire value of Reid Terrace-the first co-operative building in Scotland-£5,600.

A branch of the Association having been formed in Leith-where an equal necessity for additional house accommodation existed-one acre and a half of ground was feued at Fort Street, North Leith, on which twenty-two houses, somewhat larger than those at Stockbridge, have been erected. The selling prices for the upper and lower floors are respectively £170 and £140. Other twenty-two houses have been commenced on the same piece of ground, which will make the total value of Hawthorn Bank £6,820. At Stockbridge, adjoining the other buildings, one acre and a quarter was then feued, on which thirty-three houses, approaching completion, have been erected. The value of Hugh Miller Place is £4,630; and it is intended soon to build other thirty-three houses on the same ground.

The number of shareholders now is more than 450, and the shares taken up are about 2,200, the amount paid being over £2,150. Eighty-seven houses have been sold so readily that advertising even was unnecessary. Almost without exception the purchasers were working-men, and the money was paid either direct, or to some extent, through the Property Investment Companies-always with a readiness and pleasure which seldom characterize such transactions. Thus, in little more than two years, and with a comparatively limited capital, 117 houses have been erected, or are in course of erection, at a value of more than £17,000. The immediate object of the company is to build houses suitable for working-men, and selt them; but as the capital increases, the houses will be retained and let to the shareholders or to others. Already eighty-seven families have been comfortably supplied, and in the majority of cases the owner is the occupier, so that we can say the houses have been planned by working-men, built by working-men, bought by workingmen, and tenanted by working-men.

This isreat ag triumph-a result which even the most hopeful promoters of the movement would not have dared to anticipate. As a commercial undertaking; as a means of social amelioration; as a practical demonstration of what union, economy, and perseverance can accomplish, the Building Company is an undisputed success. But there is still much to overcome and to achieve.

One great barrier to progress is the difficulty in finding suitable sites. Plenty of ground there is lying all around the city, but it is