CHANGED ASPECTS OF VILLAGE LIFE 149 



call in the whole of the outstanding loans. But 

 the propagandists were equal to the occasion. 

 They obtained from the central fund a sum of 

 money sufficient to pay off the debts of the 

 entire village, thus getting the peasants effect- 

 ually out of the grasp of the money-lenders; 

 and they then established the co-operative credit 

 bank, debiting the peasants with the amounts 

 paid on their behalf. 



The organization of the Central Co-operative 

 Credit Bank gave a further great stimulus to 

 the general movement, so that by the end of 

 1903 there were about 2,000 local co-operative 

 credit banks in Hungary, and the year's business 

 represented a turnover of some £3,000,000. But 

 the work that is being done by the village banks 

 goes far beyond the advance to agriculturists of 

 so much money in the form of loans. 



One comes here to an especially interesting 

 phase of what may be called the " new village- 

 life " of the country. It is obligatory on the 

 members of a local co-operative credit bank in 

 Hungary that they should pay a small weekly 

 subscription — one penny, twopence, or three- 

 pence, as the case may be — towards the funds 

 from which the wants of those requiring loans 

 can be supplied. The officers of the bank at- 

 tend on the Saturday or the Sunday afternoon 



