Algeria, the depraved state of the society which follows the fashion in all things is not to be wondered at. In the time of General Randon there was much agreeable dissipation for those who liked on a small scale the life of the Court at Paris; but since Algeria has been deprived of a governor, there is nothing resembling a centre of society in Algiers.

Courts in

Of course, in all colonies there is a scarcity of women, and this leads to certain evils, the least of which is, that often the wives of men high in office, and men of superior acquirements and character, are women of very inferior rank, and often not of the best character. We remember the wife of a judge of the Algiers being condemned to one year's imprisonment for writing anonymous letters of the worst description to numbers of people in Algiers, to her friends, to the friends of her husband, to the wife of the Governor, and to people of all descriptions. She produced an extraordinary amount of doubt, distrust, and evil feeling in the town, scarcely any one of any standing but received letters, telling him or her of some evil done towards them behind their backs, or accusing them of some baseness. This lady went into the best society of Algiers, and often visited at houses and talked over these letters, and then, on leaving her friends, dropped letters to them or against them into the post. She actually employed her own daughter (a beautiful young girl of seventeen years old) to write them. At last it was found out, and both were condemned to prison; the daughter escaped with three months.

Finally, the extravagance in dress of the Algerian ladies is quite proverbial, and many of the most outrageous fashions of the French empire have been introduced by the wives of the powerful generals of the African army, who, as might be expected, are ladies of considerable influence at the Court of the Emperor.

The general ignorance of Algerian society, as compared with that of France or England, is very striking. Few books are to be seen in the shops at Algiers, and the libraries are very poorly supplied with current literature. A French lady assured us that many men never read anything but the daily papers and their account-books, and their wives nothing but their mass-books. The education which the young ladies and young men receive is much the same as in France; but as soon as they leave their schools and colleges they are exposed to the bad influences of Algerian society, and certainly do not form a very promising mass of young people to mould the destinies of their new country.

B. M.D.

XVI.—FRIENDLY SOCIETIES.

LIFE ASSURANCE has long since become an established mode of provision against the contingencies of life, among the upper and middle classes. But with one or two recent exceptions, Assurance offices have confined their business to amounts quite beyond the reach of the humbler classes. Still for even a longer period, another form of life assurance has been a favorite mode of provision for the future among the industrious poor. Working men have established Societies among themselves, which, though numerous instances of failure testify to the bad principles on which they were conducted, or the bad management with which they met, still succeeded so far as to confer great benefits on numerous districts, and to leave unshaken the faith of working men in their efficacy. In every town and in almost every village in the kingdom, such associations are to be found. They are but too frequently conducted in the public-house or one of the public-houses of the district, the owner of which allows their weekly meetings to take place under his roof, in consideration of the drink which is likely to be consumed in the course of the proceedings. Nor unfortunately does his speculation prove a barren one. To this fact might be traced many of the disasters that have overtaken these Societies. The landlord, if an unprincipled man, plays into the hands of some unscrupulous good customer, who gets the management of the affairs, is entrusted with the money, and finally decamps with it.

A Friendly Society is formed on the principle of Mutual Assurance; each member contributes a certain subscription per week or month, as may be agreed upon, in return for which the Society undertakes to pay him a certain sum weekly in sickness, or on attaining old age. In addition to this, it generally allows what is called "Burial Money," a certain sum paid to the member's family at his death.

The causes that effect the failure or secure the success of these valuable Societies form a most interesting and important branch of inquiry. The failure of institutions widely enlisting the sympathies and energies of working men, and calling forth their independence and forethought, is matter for serious regret. Their success calls for real congratulation; and he who by inquiry, skill in calculation, and knowledge of those laws which affect the subject, contributes to their future stability and progress, confers an incalculable benefit upon society. Incalculable, inasmuch as the forethought of the parent tells on the training and education of the child, and gives steadiness and strength to the very basis of the community.

The first defect, the most frequent cause of failure in these Societies, has been the inadequacy of the rates of contribution demanded from members. It is manifest that if the members of a Society pay twopence a week for mutual assurance, against a risk which to each is of the value of fourpence, bankruptcy will be the

result. Yet such a risk has been incurred on such terms over and over again. The problem of the proper rate of contribution is a work of labor to the qualified actuary; is it to be wondered at if it proved an insoluble riddle to working men? They could not avail themselves of the expensive services of the actuary, perhaps did not know that his services were available in the case. Then the Societies vary indefinitely in their constitution, and a table of rates drawn up for one would utterly mislead and ruin another.

The rates, moreover, have been inequitable as well as inadequate. It has been and still is a common practice to admit as members of Friendly Societies all persons between some specified ages-we have known one of which the range was as wide as from 16 to 60-and to charge them all alike. Now, after a certain age, the liability to sickness and to death increases every year. Other things being equal, a man is more liable to fall sick or to die at 50 than at 20. It is therefore unfair to admit the man of 50 on the same terms as the man of 20. Take a case in illustration. A Society starts with 300 members, all between the ages of 20 and 45, and all contributing the same sum per month-calculated after the lowest possible tariff-for the sake of the same benefits. For the first few years all goes on well enough, but in progress of time there is a cessation in the influx of new members. In the meanwhile all the members have become older, and their numbers diminished by death or removal. The Society, under such circumstances, presents but little attraction, and certainly offers no security to a young man contemplating the future. He perceives that the average is against him, and accordingly inquires for a Society composed of persons more nearly of his own age, even though it proceed on the same erroneous principle of making a fixed charge for members at whatever period of life they may be. He joins a younger Society; should this be a prosperous one, the members of the older Society who happen not to be above the maximum age transfer their membership to it, leaving their more aged associates to shift for themselves. These poor persons, staggering under the weight of years, struggle on for a time; but the claims of the sick increase, the funds diminish, the contributions daily becoming smaller, and the disbursements greater, and at length, finding it hopeless to attempt to carry it on, the Society is abandoned, and those who trusted to it for relief in their declining days are entirely disappointed.

One element of success is often entirely lost sight of by the founders of Friendly Benefit Societies, the element of number. It is impossible to secure a just average without a large body of members. No Society with a small number of members can be looked upon as safe, even though its tables may be founded on the most perfect law, or on the most scientific data of the statistical actuary; for should its experience turn out worse than the average, its fate is sealed.

Bad management has been another very active cause of the failure of these institutions; the books have been badly kept, the funds improperly invested, or their investment delayed, and little or no interest realized, so that the calculations are falsified, for all tables presuppose that a moderate rate of interest will be continuously realized upon the subscriptions. Add to this source of fallacious calculation, the facility afforded by careless management to fraud; the sick yield to the temptation of idleness, and remain longer than is necessary a burden on the funds, and the idle lay themselves up when there is very little the matter with them. That this is frequently the case is apparent from the fact, that the rates of sickness are higher among a given number of the members of these Societies than among an equal number of persons of the same age and occupation who are unconnected with them.

It seems desirable before proceeding with the more special object of this paper, which is to deal with Friendly Societies as a mode of investment and assurance for women, to give a short account of the state of the law with regard to them; and for this, as well as for the foregoing particulars, we are largely indebted to Mr. Scratchley's volume "on Associations for Provident Investment."

The Friendly Societies' Bills of two recent sessions have had for their object the consolidation of the laws relating to Friendly Societies, and the introduction of such improvements as experience had proved needful. Mr. Scratchley says, "There have been Acts to consolidate, Acts to amend, Acts to explain, Acts to continue, and Acts to do we know not what else; and these various Acts have all contradicted each other in the most remarkable manner." The following are the more important provisions of the Act 18 and 19 Vic. c. 63:

1. Acts repealed.

2. 3. 4. Societies under former Acts to continue, and their rules, bonds, and contracts to continue in force.

IX. It shall be lawful for any number of persons to form and establish a Friendly Society, under the provisions of this Act, for the purpose of raising by voluntary subscriptions of the members thereof, with or without the aid of donations, a fund for any of the following objects; (that is to say,)

1. For insuring a sum of money to be paid on the birth of a member's child, or on the death of a member, or for the funeral expenses of the wife or child of a member :

2. For the relief or maintenance of the members, their husbands, wives, children, brothers or sisters, nephews or nieces, in old age, sickness, or widowhood, or the endowment of members or nominees of members at any age:

3. For any purpose which shall be authorized by one of her Majesty's principal Secretaries of State, or in Scotland by the Lord Advocate, as a purpose to which the powers and facilities of this Act ought to be extended:

Provided, that no member shall subscribe or contract for an annuity exceeding thirty pounds per annum, or a sum payable on death, or on any other contingency, exceeding two hundred pounds:

And if such persons so intending to form and establish such Society shall transmit rules for the government, guidance, and regulation of the same, to the registrar aforesaid, and shall obtain his certificate that the same are in conformity with law as hereinafter mentioned, then the said Society shall be deemed to be fully formed and established from the date of the said certificate.

X. In any Society in which a sum of money may be insured payable on the death of a child under ten years of age, it shall not be lawful to pay any sum for the funeral expenses of such child, except upon production of a copy of the entry in the register of deaths, signed by the registrar of the district in which the child shall have died; and if such entry shall not state that the cause of death has been certified by a qualifi medical practitioner, or by a coroner, a certificate signed by a qualified medical practitioner, stating the probable cause of death, shall be required, and it shall not be lawful in that case to pay any sum without such certificate; and no trustee or officer of any Society upon an insurance of a sum payable for the funeral expenses of any such child, made after the passing of this Act, shall knowingly pay a sum which shall raise the whole amount receivable from one or more than one Society for the funeral expenses of a child under the age of five years to a sum exceeding six pounds, or of a child between five and ten years to a sum exceeding ten pounds; and any such trustee or officer who shall make any such payment otherwise than as aforesaid, or who shall pay any sum without endorsing the amount which he shall pay on the back or at the foot of the copy of entry signed by the said registrar, shall be liable to a penalty not exceeding five pounds for every such offence, upon conviction thereof before two justices of the county or borough in which such death shall have taken place : The said registrar shall be entitled to receive, upon delivery of such copy of entry, for the purpose of receiving money from a Friendly Society, a fee of one shilling, and it shall not be lawful for him to deliver more than one such copy for such purpose, except by the order of a justice of the peace.

XI. And whereas many provident, benevolent, and charitable institutions and Societies are formed and may be formed for the purpose of relieving the physical wants and necessities of persons in poor circumstances, or for improving the dwellings of the laboring classes, or for granting pensions, or for providing habitations for the members or other persons elected by them, and it is expedient to afford protection to the funds thereof: be it enacted, that if two copies of the rules of any such institution or Society, and from time to time the like copies of any alterations or amendments made in the same, signed by three members and the Secretary thereof, shall be transmitted to the registrar aforesaid, such registrar shall,