of magical with industry might succeed for the sake of their brethren - respect themselves, to entertain no uncomfortable or ungenerous erteam of her master's mocves; but like men of sense in the midle tias, o ix their accension on the tendency of the scheme to pramate their ova beneris, and give their employers honourable credit for a proposal whose sendency is the workman's advantage. Made in the face of the nation, applanded by the most eminent friends of labour, the scmpact could never go back if they were faithful to it; and me nociest experiment tommenced in our time would be dated from those pis a wich they worked. It was now in their power not only to raise their wages, bus to raise their order." I can bear my testimony, from examination, that the system of accounts devised by the Messrs. Briggs for enabling the men to secure the profit that may accrue to them is simple, accessile, and satisfactory. The experiment bids fair to succeed, as more coal has been worked since is was commenced than has been worked before in the same time.

With that eommercial sagacity which belongs to Manchester, the new principle of partnership of industry has been quickly appreciated by the financial agents, Messrs. Greening and Co., who advise its introductice into new companies. A new company, entitled the Clayton Plate and Bar Iron Company, includes among its directors names boccured in the ranks of labour, those of Jacob Bright, Alderman Abei Heywood, and Dr. John Watts. This company carries the new principle of parmership further than the Messrs. Briggs, and includes, like a co-operative store, the customer in the division of profits. After 10 per cent. has been realised for the capitalists, the sum of prodit in excess is divided into three equal parts-one-third to the purchasers from the company during the year, in proportion to the sums paid by each for goods; one-third to the shareholders, according to the shares held by each; one-third to the officers, clerks, and workmen, according to the salaries or wages of each of them during the year. This is the most perfect approach to that definition of cooperation which Mr. J. S. Mill, M.P., gave at the Whittington Club, London, in 1864. His words were—“It is not co-operation where a few persons join for the purpose of making a profit from cheap purchases, by which only a portion of them benefit. Co-operation is where the whole of the produce is divided. What is wanted is that the whole of the working classes should partake of the profits of labour. We want that the whole produce of labour shall, as far as the nature of things permit, be divided among the contributors and producers."

Thus, on this shrewd system of the Partnership of Industry, the customers who keep the works always going by the continuity of their orders, save waste and delay, and create more than the return they receive. The workmen, by their intelligent faithfulness, create more than the addition to their wages awarded to them, and the capitalist not only secures his percentage of interest, but new additions which otherwise wou'd never exist. Only two firms at present appear to understand this-the Whitwood and Clayton Companies.

Even the Colliery Guardian, which should understand the interest of the coal and iron masters, indulges in demented ridicule of "the sanguine expectations of the benevolent gentlemen who penned the prospectus of the Clayton Plate Company." Because philanthropists have an earlier sense of justice than other men, and are first inclined to an equitable scheme, the mere trading spectator sees nothing but philanthropy in it, and overlooks the element of industrial equity in it, and does not know that equity always pays.

Owing to the confusion of ideas that attends all new subjects, even the workmen everywhere damage their own case, and consent to describe this division of new profits as a "bonus to labour," whereas it is really a new bonus to capital. Even in Rochdale, where good sense is prevalent, the co-operators will call it a "bonus to labour," which gives a false idea to capitalists-obscures in their mind what they are called upon to agree to, and gives them the impression that they are required, on grounds of philanthropy, to relinquish a portion of their profits as capitalists in favour of workmen who have no capital themselves. It was this confusion of ideas that caused the Rochdale Manufacturing Society to retrace its steps and blunder back into the old system of care and loss; which appears to gain all while it loses half. The Manufacturing Society of Rochdale gave up their plan not, as the London Spectator said, because it failedthey gave it up before they tried it. The majority never understood the principle of it. They said, "Why should we give a portion of our profits to workmen? Other employers do not." They did not see that instead of giving profits they would gain more profits. They did not see that the profits proposed to be divided were extra profitsnew profits which would never exist but by this arrangement; and the wiser minority who did understand it were not allowed to raise this issue, and it was predicted at the time by the present reader, in a paper contributed to the Morning Star, that shrewd masters would be the first to see their way to it.

The head of a family who observes what takes place in his own house, knows enough to understand this question. Good servants are so scarce that few householders have the good fortune to meet with them. An educated, managing, economical, trusty servant or nurse, will always save more than her wages and cost. You never care to a guinea or two what wages you pay her. You do not give it to her, she gives to you more than that, by her personal economy, by the example she sets, and the peace which she diffuses around her; by the absence of superstitious tales, coarse habits, and ignorant speech, which otherwise would contaminate your family, who must in their childhood come in contact with her. And in great commercial undertakings, what high salaries are given to managers of ability and trust, who can think for themselves, and think to some purpose, and by their care, foresight, judgment, and administrative talent, increase the reputation and profits of the concern. This quality of men is very rare. A manager whose mind and disposition is wholesome and genial, who can be busy without being petulant, active without being

tyrannical, and display with all a creative business capacity, earn their high salaries many times over. The munificent remuneration they receive is never spoken of as a bonus to servants. It is well understood economy to pay them well.

The same rule holds good in the Partnerships of Labour. They are not devised as philanthropic plans. They arise in an extension of commercial sagacity. These gentlemen who take the lead, foresee that if it is economy to give the leading servants in a firm an interest in what they are doing-it must be equally an act of economy to give the whole body an interest in what they are doing. If anyone writes to Mr. Mill, Professor Fawcett, or Louis Blanc, and solicits notice of this step from these distinguished authorities, whose word of approval is reputation-if Mr. Mill does, as he has done in his new edition of his "Political Economy," publish words of priceless dis tinction of the Messrs. Briggs' proposal-it is done because they were the first to adopt a plan of a new and enlightened form of self-interest, which includes with their own benefit also the benefit of the workman. But when the public begin to understand what really takes place, they will cease to regard this new plan of the Partnership of Labour as a philanthrophic one; they will estimate it as a new form of enlightened commercial shrewdness which pays.

The fact is, Political Economy-that unrecognised benefactor of the working classes-is apt to mistake the mechanic for the machine. It sees that the workman must have average wages, or he will go elsewhere; but it does not otherwise see that the workman is a live thing, and that he has within him a brain and will, which, if pur chased, will also produce profit. The old system of mastership merely buys his stomach-the new Partnership of Industry buys his thought and energy, and this new investment will pay better than the old. The scheme will not at first advance rapidly, because workmen are often incapable of enduring any plan by which an employer profits; and will rather forego a great addition to their own wages than see him gain by it. I could tell of scores of schemes, in which gentle men have risked their fortunes to benefit workmen, who as soon as they saw that their intending benefactors expected to gain a profit able investment for their money by it, these scoundrel workmen-as they would deserve to be called had they sense enough to see what they were doing-ceased to support it, and caused the ruin of the generous projectors. Whereas it was to the interest of the workmen that these capitalists should benefit, and be known to benefit most, when they included in their schemes the benefit of the workmen. No fear that these Partnerships of Industry will advance too fast. They are too good for that. If it be true that nothing succeeds like success, it is more true that nothing progresses so slowly as progress.

It would however be ingratitude to conclude this subject without acknowledgments to Mr. Scholefield, M.P. for Birmingham, for the Bill he introduced, and to Mr. Milner Gibson, who, on the part of the Government, have carried it through Parliament-making it legal for any employer or shopkeeper to pay his workmen or servants with a

proportion of his profit, without making the workman or servant a partner, and placing the whole property of the concern at his mercy. We owe thanks to that great Lord Chancellor who lately occupied the woolsack for his powerful and sagacious support of this Bill in the House of Lords, who confuted the ancient fallacies of commercial authorities, and rendered these Partnerships of Industry legal in England.

RAILWAY MANAGEMENT.

On an Official Inspection of Railways and the Management of the Traffic thereon, as a Means of Preventing Accident and Loss. By EDWIN HILL, of the Inland Revenue.

RECENT disclosures have made public the disquieting fact that the elaborate and carefully considered regulations laid down by the directors of our various railways for the guidance of their servants in the management of the traffic-including the precautions to be observed when portions of the lines are necessarily under repairare in practice commonly disregarded, and that to such an extent as to render their promulgation all but useless.

Breaches of these regulations cannot be unattended with danger, and therefore ought never to be passed over without punishment; instead of which such violations, however flagrant they may be, commonly receive but little notice, if any, except when they lead to immediate accident; hence they become habitual. And when accident really does occur the anger excited against the parties in fault is proportioned rather to the extent of the damage done, than to the amount of the neglect that led to it. Thus treated, accidents are naturally looked upon rather as instances of bad luck than as the sure consequences of habits of neglect ; nor can the eradication of this mischievous feeling be expected, consistently with experience, from anything short of a vigorous and steady enforcement of the rules laid down; all breaches being sternly punished, whether followed by accident or not, on the plain ground that with the enormous forces employed the habitual neglect of the necessary precautions can lead to nothing but disaster, first or last.

It has often been proposed to call upon the legislature to make regulations for the management of the railways, such regulations to have the force of law. But the fatal objection is instantly raised that by such course the responsibility of the railway authorities would be destroyed, as responsibility without power is a mere delusion.

Some have even proposed that the Government shall take the whole administration of the railways into their hands.

I do not here attempt to discuss this proposition, my object being to suggest an intermediate course; one which is easy of trial, and which if adopted, it would be advantageous to continue, let the

administration of the railways ultimately devolve upon whomsoever it may.

What I have to bring under consideration is the propriety of adopting in respect of the railways, a system of official inspection analogous to that in operation as regards our factories, inines, schools, poor-law unions, and prisons.

Mere inspection with communication of the result. Every power necessary for the attainment of full and correct information upon all matters affecting the public safety and convenience, both directly and indirectly, but no power whatever of interference in the management. The inspectors to be simply held responsible for discovering and bringing to light everything in the management of the lines under their charge respectively, that experience has shown, or that they may deem to be detrimental to the public safety, or needlessly obstructive of the public convenience.

It is unnecessary to go into particulars respecting the duties that it would be proper to throw upon such inspectors, inasmuch as the experience gained in the working of the system of inspection as now carried on is so ample that there could be no difficulty in framing suitable instructions; and after all it is not on the framing of the instructions, but on the choice of the men appointed to carry out the purpose that the success of the measure must depend. Able and zealous men will, for the most part, themselves discover the path to a successful result, whilst inefficient men will be all but certain to miss it, though it be mapped out for them never so clearly.

It is needless for me to dilate upon the efficiency of simple but systematic inspection and report in procuring the removal of curable evils. The manifold defects that have been brought to light by our poor-law inspectors, prison inspectors, factory and school inspectors, and others, and that in consequence have been either cured wholly or at least much amended, are not unknown, although perhaps not so generally understood and borne in mind as might be wished. But that one of the most effectual means of abating injurious practices and effecting the suppression of abuse, is, to expose them to the broad light of publicity, is a matter too generally understood and acknowledged to need argument. All I have to urge, therefore, is the superiority of continuous, systematic, and thorough examination and inquiry, conducted by men of ability and knowledge of the subject, appointed for the purpose, and hence responsible in their character and position for its due performance, over depending upon mere fortuitous information given by persons perchance but imperfectly acquainted with the facts, and concerning not so much the habitual observance or neglect of the appointed precautions, as simply the ill-consequences of their non-observance in individual

cases.

Under such a system of inspection I think I may unhesitatingly aver that such a total neglect of the necessary precautions explicitly laid down by the directors, as, in the case of the late Staplehurst accident was shown to attach equally to the workmen, the foremen,