rected to the care of
children and to the workhouses, through which channels private aid reaches
the recipient. Still, among 22,000 guardians of the poor the number of
women hardly reaches 1000. The old prejudice against women asserted itself
even in this field. A "Society for Promoting the Return of Women as
Poor-law Guardians" is endeavoring to hasten reform.[51]

The Englishman has the valuable characteristic of forming organizations
that strive to achieve very definite, though often temporary, ends, thus
giving private initiative great flexibility. Such an organization, with a
limited purpose, is the "Woman's Cooperative Gild," founded in 1883. Its
purpose is to promote the cooperative movement (as far as consumption is
concerned) among women, and to show them their enormous social and
economic power as _consumers_. Women are the chief purchasers, as they
purchase the housekeeping supplies. It is to their interest to purchase
through the cooperative associations that exclude the middlemen, and at
the end of the year pay a dividend to the members of the associations.
These associations can exercise an important social influence inasmuch as
they create model conditions of labor for their employees (short working
day, high wages, early closing of the shops, no work on Sundays or
holidays, opportunity to sit down during working hours, insurance against
sickness, old age insurance, sanitary conditions of labor, etc.). The Gild
organizes women into cooperative societies, and by theoretical as well as
practical studies informs the women of the advantages of the cooperative
system. The movement to-day numbers 26,000 members.

In England a marked increase in the use of alcoholic liquors among women
was noticed; whereupon legal and medical measures were taken to curb the
evil. The most effective measure would be an attack on the drunkenness of
the husband, which destroys the home.

The official report of the first English school for mothers, located in
St. Pancras, London, has just appeared. This report shows that the
experiment has been entirely successful. Of all measures to decrease the
death rate among children, the establishment of schools for mothers is the
best. During the course of instruction the young married women were
recommended to organize mothers' clubs in order to secure the necessaries
of life more cheaply. The school for mothers also attempts to give the
young mothers nourishing meals, which can be furnishe