ORGANISATION. 173 



has adopted when entering upon its new role of central 

 society for two great co-operative organisations, and for 

 that purpose instituting a distinct co-operative department, 

 accepting delegates selected by the Co-operative Unions 

 as ex-officio members of the Board of that department, 

 might have proved convenient for the purpose. The Bank 

 of France has set a rather similar example, placing a dis- 

 tinctly agricultural " Regent " on its Board, as a tribute 

 to and recognition of Agriculture, with which it has a 

 very large amount of business doing. 



However, in the main, what the farmer buys, or is at 

 present thinking of buying, he buys for business purposes. 

 And his object is cheapness and the obtainment of a genuine 

 article. Those among us who still look at Co-operation 

 askance, as a help only for the small man and the poor — 

 just as Credit, now the mainspring of all business, used to 

 be reckoned a matter only for the embarrassed — will do 

 well to have regard to the latter point — of genuine quality. 

 It is not price so much which serves as an occasion for 

 dishonest enrichment — or, let us say, ostensible price. To 

 a certain extent the markets regulate the figure. Looking 

 at the mere nominal price, the large farmer who despises 

 Co-operation may affirm that he buys his'^goods just as 

 cheaply from his local dealer " Smith " or " Brown "fas 

 does the co-operative society from its own'^purveyor. But 

 are his goods worth the money ? There is a terrible amount 

 of cheating going on by adulteration. Our Board of Agri- 

 culture is at times besieged by applications to take the 

 matter in its hand, testing the goods and pillorying the wrong- 

 doer. We have had a leading seedsman of a Northern county 

 confessing, under examination before a Parliamentary 

 Committee, that he must adulterate, since that had become 

 a recognised custom of his trade. In Sussex we (the 

 " Sussex Association for the Improvement of Agriculture ") 

 put the matter to a practical test in the case of grass seeds, 

 and the late Mr. Faunce de Laune, who was a special student 

 of the subject, owned himself struck with the large amount 

 of fraud that we had in this way detected. On this 

 ground he pronounced our experiment (which was faultily 



