(hi Practical Coqperafive Societies. 587 



pears, plums, and cherries, grow in great luxuriance in this 

 place. I am. Sir, &c. 



Wm. Hinkert. 

 Boyal Nurseri/, Mjmic/i, May 3. 1 829. 



Art. IV. On Practical Coopei-alive Societies, as a means of 



ameliorating the Condition of the Laborious Classes, tvith some 



Account (yf the Brighton Cooperative Society/. By Philan- 

 thropist. 



Sir, 



In the spirit of doing good, which pervades your pages, 

 allow me to introduce to your notice a subject you have never 

 yet handled, and are perhaps entirely ignorant of, but which is 

 also calculated, like the measures you recommend, to promote 

 independence, virtue, and happiness. The ground it stands 

 upon is entirely practical, and all its merits consist in its having 

 been reduced to practice in Brighton : 1 mean, " Practical 

 Cooperation." A society of workmen was formed in Brigh- 

 ton about July 1827, for the purpose of acquiring a knowledge 

 of the principles of Cooperation, and of reducing them to 

 practice. The principles are simply two : first, to form a 

 common capital, by a weekly subscription, like a benefit 

 society ; secondly, to employ that capital, in trade, and in 

 giving work to their own members. 



Consistently with these principles, the Society laid out their 

 subscriptions in articles of daily consumption, which were 

 retailed to the members and the public, giving the profits 

 to the Society. The business was first done by a member, 

 gratis. When it increased, so as to take up a person's 

 whole time, one member was appointed agent, with a weekly 

 salary of one pound, which, since the Society has been found 

 to prosper, has been increased to twenty-five shillings. When 

 the common capital became larger than the shop required, 

 they hired about twenty-eight acres of land, about ten miles 

 from Brighton, which is chiefly cultivated as a garden. 

 Here they now employ five of their members and one 

 lad, the son of a member, as an apprentice. As the capi- 

 tal increases, they will employ more, and they will employ 

 them in other trades, as well as that of gardening, accordingly 

 as they appear to be most profitable ; the ultimate object 

 being to employ all the members upon their own capital, so 

 as to receive themselves the whole produce of their labour. 



e c 2 



