The drawing-room
meetings of the parent society attracted audiences until they outgrew
drawing-rooms, because of the exceptional quality of the men and women
who attended them and the novelty of the doctrines promulgated. These
conditions were not repeated in each district of London, and in spite
of constant paper planning, and not a little service by the older
members, who spent their time and talents on tiny meetings in Paddington
or Streatham, the London group system has never been a permanent
success. What has kept the Society together is the series of fortnightly
meetings carried on regularly from the first, which themselves fluctuate
in popularity, but which have never wholly failed.[26]
* * * * *
We now return to the point whence this digression started. Our local
societies were then flourishing. They were vigorously supported from
London. We had funds for the expenses of lecturers and many willing to
give the time. W.S. De Mattos was employed as lecture secretary, and
arranged in the year 1891-2 600 lectures, 300 of them in the provinces.
In all 3339 lectures by members during the year were recorded. All this
activity imparted for a time considerable vitality to the local
societies, and on February 6th and 7th, 1892, the first (and for twenty
years the last) Annual Conference was held in London, at Essex Hall.
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