the "general" tracts have been written by Sidney Webb and Bernard Shaw.
A few other writers have contributed general tracts from a special
standpoint, such as those on Christian Socialism. When we have mentioned
reprinted papers by William Morris and Sir Oliver Lodge, and a tract by
Sidney Ball, the list is virtually complete. Mr. Wells himself only
contributed to us his paper "This Misery of Boots," and his appeal to
the rank and file yielded nothing at all. Of course there are plenty of
people as innocent in this respect as Mr. Wells was at that period
referred to. Hardly a month has passed in the last twenty years without
somebody, usually from the remote provinces, sending up a paper on
Socialism, which he is willing to allow the Society to publish on
reasonable terms. But only once have we thus found an unknown author
whose work, on a special subject, we could publish, and he resigned a
year or two later because we were compelled to reject a second tract
which he wrote for us.

The history of the intervention of Mr. Wells is now complete. Some
account of the expansion of the Society at this period will be given in
the next chapter.

[Illustration: _From a drawing by Jessie Holliday_

SIDNEY WEBB, IN 1909]

FOOTNOTES:

[34] The "Wells Report" in October, 1906, recommended cordial
co-operation with the Labour Party, including the running of candidates
for Parliament, and it "warmly endorsed the conception of Socialists
whenever possible,... standing as Socialists in Municipal and
Parliamentary elections." In January, 1908, a scheme for effecting this
was adopted by the Society. In May, 1908, Mr. Wells, writing to "Fabian
News," said he should resign if the Society rejected his view that "the
Fabian Society is a Society for the study, development, and propaganda
of the Socialist idea. It extends a friendly support to the Labour
Party, but it is not a political society and membership involves no
allegiance to any political party."

This was written in connection with his support of a Liberal against a
Socialist Candidate at North-West Manchester.

[35] In his election address referred to on p. 179.

[36] Private.--Report of the special Committee appointed in February,
1906, to consider measures for increasing the scope, influence, income,
and activity of the Society, together with the Executive Committee's
Report, and Resolutions thereon. To be submitted to the members at Essex
Hall on Fridays the 7th and 1