t
has prepared five tracts for the Society, published in the general list,
under a sub-title, "The Women's Group Series," and it has taken an
active part, both independently and in co-operation with other bodies,
in the political movements specially affecting women, which have been
so numerous in recent years.

* * * * *

It will be recollected that the only direct result of the Special
Enquiry Committee, apart from the changes made in the organisation of
the Society itself, was the decision to promote local Socialist
Societies of the Fabian type with a view to increasing Socialist
representation in Parliament. I have recounted in a previous chapter how
this scheme worked out in relation to the Labour Party and the running
of candidates for Parliament. It remains to describe here its measure of
success in the formation of local societies.

The summer of 1905 was about the low-water mark of provincial Fabianism.
Nine societies are named in the report, but four of these appeared to
have no more than a nominal existence. The Oxford University Society had
but 6 members; Glasgow had 30 in its University Society and 50 in its
town Society; Liverpool was reduced to 63, Leeds and County to 15, and
that was all. A year later the Cambridge University Society had been
formed, Oxford had more than doubled its membership to 13, but only five
other societies were in existence. By the following year a revival had
set in. W. Stephen Sanders, at that time an Alderman of the London
County Council, who had been a member of the Society since 1890 and of
the executive Committee since 1904, was appointed Organising Secretary
with the special object of building up the provincial organisation. By
1910 there were forty-six local societies, and in 1912 the maximum of
fifty was reached. Since then the number has declined. These societies
were scattered over the country, some of them in the great cities,
Manchester, Newcastle, Sheffield, and so on: others within hail of
London, at Croydon, Letchworth, Ilford: others again in small towns,
Canterbury, Chelmsford, Carnarvon: another was at Bedales School,
Petersfield, run by my son and his schoolfellows. The local societies
formed at this period, apart from the University Societies, were in the
main pallid reflections of the parent Society in its earlier days; none
of them had the good fortune to find a member, so far as we yet know, of
even second-class rank as a th