Page 188 - The_story_of_the_C._W._S._The_jubilee_history_of_the_cooperative_wholesale_society,_limited._1863-1913_(IA_storyofcwsjubill00redf) (1)_Neat

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The Story of the C.W.S.
and provision trade were curiously equal, being £6,103 and £6,102
respectively. In the following complete year these sales totalled
£59,467 and £13,226, or £72,693 in all. The small establishment
soon proved too small and unworthy of the C.W.S. " What's the
good of you offering me sugar? " the managers of one or two large
societies would say to the C.W.S. Bristol salesman, " we could buy
you up any day." So a large warehouse in Christmas Street was
leased in June, 1888, and formally opened on October 4th of the same
year by J. T. W. Mitchell, in the presence of more than a hundred
delegates. Yet the West still asked for more. At the Quarterly
Meetings of 1889 it was moved that the Bristol Depot should be raised
to the rank of a branch, with its own Committee, and so made equal
to London and Newcastle ; but, withdrawn once, and then brought
up again, the proposition finally was defeated at the December
meeting.
The different C.W.S. employees at the London Branch who came
down to Bristol mostly were true to the London tradition. They
regarded their promotion rather as an exile. Bristol, nevertheless,
is one of the most picturesque and interesting of British cities. Its
streets and quays
Close to thine ancient walls
Come subtle whisperings of the Severn Sea .
Of cave and crag and seaward mystery.
—are crammed with history. Yet, curiously enough, the city is not
of great antiquity. Although the remains of Roman and British
camps stand over the Avon gorge, the authenticated historical
existence of Bristol itself hardly covers a thousand years. Moreover,
its debt to prelates, lords, and kings is less than none. Bristol has
owed its importance entirely to trade, the kings being generally in
debt to its wealthy merchants. In modern times, unhke Manchester,
Sheffield, or Nottingham, the city has not thriven upon some staple
export. For the most part it has become an importing and
manufacturing centre for the counties around it. Possessing a score
of trades, Bristol is dependent upon no single one. It is literally the
metropoUs of the West, more picturesque than the big metropoHs,
and cleaner also, while as rich as London in the luxiu-iance of its
gardens, parks, and river valley. On the other side looms the fact
of low wages in the agricultm-al West, upon which the trade of
Bristol has speciahsed in providing cheap goods made by cheap
labour. " A city of churches, public-houses, and charity," of " low
wages, bad housing, educational handicaps, and private monopohes :"
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