hreatened subversion
of the powers hitherto exercised by private proprietors of the national
land and capital ventures plainly to warn all such proprietors that the
establishment of Socialism in England means nothing less than the
compulsion of all members of the upper class, without regard to sex or
condition, to work for their own living." The tract, which is a very
brief one, goes on to recommend the proprietary classes to "support all
undertakings having for their object the parcelling out of waste or
inferior lands amongst the labouring class" for sundry plausible
reasons. At the foot of the title page, in the smallest of type, is the
following: "Note.--Great care should be taken to keep this tract out of
the hands of radical workmen, Socialist demagogues and the like, as they
are but too apt to conclude that schemes favourable to landlords cannot
be permanently advantageous to the working class." This elaborate joke
was, except for one amendment, adopted as drafted on June 5th, 1885, and
there is a tradition that it was favourably reviewed by a Conservative
newspaper!

The Society still met as a rule at 17 Osnaburgh Street, or in the rooms
of Frank Podmore at 14 Dean's Yard, Westminster, but it was steadily
growing and new members were elected at every meeting. Although most of
the members were young men of university education, the Society included
people of various ages. To us at any rate Mrs. James Hinton, widow of
Dr. Hinton, and her sisters, Miss Haddon and Miss Caroline Haddon,
seemed to be at least elderly. Mrs. Robins, her husband (a successful
architect), and her daughter, who acted as "assistant" honorary
secretary for the first eighteen months, lent an air of prosperous
respectability to our earliest meetings. Mr. and Mrs. J. Glode
Stapleton, who were prominent members for some years, were remarkable
amongst us because they drove to our meetings in their own brougham! The
working classes, as before mentioned, had but a single representative.
Another prominent member at this period was Mrs. Charlotte M. Wilson,
wife of a stock-broker living in Hampstead, who a short time later
"simplified" into a cottage at the end of the Heath, called Wildwood
Farm, now a part of the Garden Suburb Estate, where Fabians for many
years held the most delightful of their social gatherings. Mrs. Wilson
was elected to the Executive of five in December, 1884 (Mrs. Wilson, H.
Bland, E.R. Pease, G. Bernard Shaw and F. Keddell),