sured of his profit, the manufacturer has no motive to reduce the cost of production by the invention of laborsaving and expense-saving machinery."

"In one word, monopoly despoiles and oppresses all classes of the community. and debilitates and impoverishes the state."

When the fine spun college logic of many of these propositions is untwisted in the practical affairs of modern business its value as an industrial guide is greatly impaired.

In considering these propositions and applying them to business affairs we should see, not only the immediate, but the ultimate effect.

Competition between buyers does not permanently enhance the price, because this competition is demand and one of his propositions is that demand increases the supply, consequently the increased supply will reduce the price, therefore demand of buyers, which is competition, ultimately reduces price to producers. We all know by experience that many of our staple goods, in greatest demand, were once high priced and now are cheap.

This fact grinds that rock of economic logic into dust.

There may be a situation where there is too much competition as well. as where there is too much monopoly. We have no knowledge of an absolutee monoply "oppressing all classes and impoverishing the state," we can hardly conceive it, but we do have knowledge of competition oppressing those employed in and impoverishing those operating it. It was under the highly praised and officially crowned free competitive system and in those industries wherein prevailed the fiercest commercial conflict, there de

veloped those distressing conditions of poverty from which the loudest and most general complaints have come, under which labor was reduced to a crust and a bone and the cry for bread repeatedly heard, and Homestead, Hazleton and the Hocking Valley were the scenes of riots that spilled the blood of men and made their children orphans.

Turning from these dark pages let

us take note that in those industries enjoying modified competition we find no complaint of consumers, no cry of distress from employes, but constant employment instead; no riots (except among competitors) and no appeal to the State for police or militia. (To be continued.)

charming?"

A. "I can quite understand her being thought so."

Q. "I like her very much. She is one of my closest friends. I always understood that she admires you immensely."

A. "Very possibly she does. It is one of the tragedies of life that we cannot like every one that likes us." Q. "Why don't you like her?" A. "Oh, I don't know. Dr. Fell, I suppose. I wish it was otherwise; but there it is."

That is, perhaps, quite frank enough; but you could, if you liked (but it is a great mistake) be franker still. Thus: Course II.

Question. "You know the Blanks, don't you?"

Answer. "I know them, yes."

Q. "You don't like them, then?"

A. "No; I'm sorry to say I don't."

I thought everyone liked them. Don't you like her?"

A. "No. She strikes me as a bore and a tuft-hunter."

This ought to settle it; but you must be prepared for the whole conversation getting round to the Blanks very shortly, with the usual complications. Course III.

The third course is to preserve your conscience by diplomacy. Thus: Question. "You know the Blanks. don't you?"

Answer. "The Blanks? Oh, yes. It was there that I met that strange Madame Bortsch, the Russian exile. I wonder if you ever saw her. I never was so impressed by a personality. By the way, she told me a very curious story of dual personality-quite a Jekyll and Hyde in real life, only, if possible, more sinister."

Here you tell the story, and by the time it is over the Blanks will have receded into the background.

Push My

VI.

ND as the Child sat there, a little Mouse rustled from among the dry leaves of the former year, and a Lizard half glided from a crevice in the rock, and both of them fixed their bright eyes upon the little stranger; and when they saw that he designed them no evil, they took courage and came nearer to him.

"I should like to live with you," said the Child to the two little creatures, in a soft subdued voice that he might not frighten them. "Your chambers are so snug, so warm, and yet so shaded, and the flowers grow in at your windows, and the birds sing you their morning song, and call you to table and to bed with their clear warblings."

"Yes.," said the Mouse, "it would be all very well if all the plants bore nuts and mast, instead of those silly flowers; and I were not obliged to grub under ground in the spring, and gnaw the bitter roots, whilst they are dressing themselves in their fine flowers and flaunting it to the world, as if they had endless stores of honey in their cellars."

"Hold your tongue," interrupted the Lizard, pertly; "do you think, because you are gray, that other people must throw away their handsome clothes, or let them lie in the dark wardrobe under ground, and wear nothing but gray too? I am

not so

envious. The flowers may dress themselves as they like for me; they pay for it out of their own pockets, and they feed bees and beetles from their cups; but what I want to know is, of what use are birds in the world? Such a fluttering and chattering, truly, from morning early to evening late, that one is worried and stuned to death, and there is never a day's peace for them. And they do nothing; only snap up the flies and the spiders out of the mouths of such as I. For my part, I should be perfectly satisfied, provided all the birds in the world were flies and beetles."

The Child changed color, and his heart was sick and saddened when he heard their evil tongues. He could not imagine how anybody could speak ill of the beautiful flowers, or scoff at his beloved birds. He was waked out of a sweet dream, and the wood seemed to him lonely and desert, and he was ill at ease. He started up hastily, so that the Mouse and the Lizard shrank back in alarm, and did not look around them till they thought themselves safe out of the reach of the stranger with the large, severe eyes.

But the Child went away from the place; and as he hung down his head, thoughtfully, he did not observe that he took the wrong path, nor see how the flowers on either side bowed their heads to welcome him, nor hear how the old birds from the boughs, and the young from the nests, cried aloud