A DARBING CLUB EXPERIMENT IN LONDON.

Thames Star, Volume VII, Issue 2103, 30 September 1875, Page 2

A DARBING CLUB EXPERIMENT IN LONDON.

The Albeinarle Club has at last, after many months' delay, opened its doow. This is an association organised on the principle of ignoring sex, and giving to men and women together the ordinary facilities of a London Club, It is the first experiment of the kind. There is a club for women separately already in existence >->_ on a small scale, but there never has been^N one where the two "sexes meet on even terms. Bold as the venture is, it has the countenance of some of the best women and men in England, and it begins with over three hundred members, having accommodation for five hundred. Care has been taken to meet some of the obvious difficulties in the case. Only some of the rooms are to be used in common. There is a separate drawing-room fqr ladies, and a smoking-room for men, froni which ladies are expressly excluded-^ though smoking among ladies is not unknown. The dining-room is open to both, but if a lady likes a cup of tea in the ladies' drawing-room, she may have that. At present there 13 nothing m the rules to prevent a member of the club from asking a friend of either sex to lunch or dinner. The only security taken on this point is that the name of the guest and host shall be entered together in a book open to inspection. The marriage relation gave rise to some debate, I hear, in connection with the question of membership; but it was decided that the club had nothing to do with it; in other words that a wife might be a member without her husband, and the husband, of course, without his wife. I indicate only one or two out of several curious points of inquiry, some of which remain yet iv doubc, and yet must be disposed of. The experiment is made in perfect good faith, and the club is entitled—since they would make it—to fair treatment. But it is difficult to see how its life can be prolonged without giving rise to scandali though scaijdaj and entire innocence, as is often the easej, go together, or to belieye that' its' metn"bers will not by-and-bye find that they have made a mistake. — Correspondent; New York Tribune;