(Further attention will be given to this point lower down.) Under
such circumstances, co-operative banks may usefully be made
to take up their place side by side with savings banks, as was
indeed recommended by Lord Avebury in Parliament as long
ago as in 1887, in imitation of what has been actually done, to
very great pubHc advantage, alike in Germany, where the savings
banks envy the new comers, and in Italy, where they have warmly
welcomed those institutions, which go on covering the unoccupied
ground, inch by inch, attracting deposits, " drop by drop, as in a
stalactite grotto," to quote M. Luzzatti's favourite simile. Both
countries are the better for the presence of these popular thrift
banks, and in both have they been found capable of accumulating



CO-OPERATIVE BANKS AS SAVINGS BANKS 127

very large sums, which are now at the community's disposal
for useful purposes, and which without them would lie practically
idle. Like our own Trustee Banks in their favouring North, bidding
against the Post Office Savings Bank— which in some places they
leave "out of the running" ahogether— co-operative banks have
been able to offer, in addition to that valuable help of counsel
and personal interest, which is so much appreciated by the
poor, many new facilities for laying by, such as, in the judgment
of so experienced a savings bank actuary as Mr. Meikle, consti-
tute "the secret of success." More particularly as "collecting
banks" have they proved superior to any similar institution.
For they know the inhabitants of their district, they can get at
them, they have influence with them. They have local public
opinion with them, which is a powerful force in a small community.
They may influence small folk to save and deposit when nobody
else could.
