'rhat Committee had to buy its own experience, and

Jnl:y 18th, lPOO. 198

'rhat Committee had to buy its own experience, and a costly commodity it was for women strikin~ out new paths amidst apathetic, if not hostile social Ideas. Berners Club went through various ups and downs for some seven years, and when it wound up its affairs in 1878, the Somerville opened almost simultaneously in Mortimer Street, an offshoot from the old root, organised by a few who bad felt ·the value of a club and hoped that they could keep a meeting place together, modestly furnished as regards creature comforts, but with high attractions as regards intellectual food in the form of a well equipped reading room and frequent lectures and discussions-all things common enough now, but far, very far, rarer then.