IN PRAISE OF LUXURY: IN the North American Review for February "Some Aspects of Luxury" are discussed by Mr. F. Spencer Baldwin, Professor of Economics in Boston University. He declares the justifiableness of luxury to be one of the most debated subjects in the field of social economics. THE ECONOMIC ARGUMENT AGAINST LUXURY. Luxury has been severely dealt with by economists and moralists. Mr. Baldwin wards off both classes of assailant. He finds two main counts in the economic indictment-(1) "Luxury diminishes the industrial efficiency of the individual," and (2) "luxury retards the accumulation of capital." The first he dismisses as applying only to a certain kind of luxury and to a certain class of person :— The economist who indicts luxury on the ground that it makes men lazy loses sight entirely of the effect of the prospect of luxury in making men work. If luxury itself tends to slacken the energies of individuals, the desire for luxury tends to quicken their energies. The second tendency is at least as strong as the first. I am inclined to believe it the stronger. Men would probably work less rather than more if the prospect of luxury were taken away. A very powerful motive to industrial activity would thus be destroyed. LUXURY SOCIALLY PREFERABLE TO SAVING!' The second count-that luxury retards the formation of capital-he accepts as indisputably true, but considers to tell for and not against luxury. As society is at present constituted, "the classic dogma of the universal beneficence of saving" can no longer be maintained. He says: If everyone spent only the necessary minimum, saved as much as possible, and invested the savings in productive enterprises, obviously the demand for the products of these investments would be cut off, and the whole industrial machinery would be brought to a standstill. A state of general over-production, or under-consumption would result, if all members of society acted strictly according to the advice of the economist. It is probable that society at the present time is suffering from an excess of saving, and the accompanying phenomenon of under-consumption. If we spent more and saved less, the industrial situation would be improved. An increase in expenditure would restore the lost equilibrium between production and demand. The conclusion follows, then, that under present conditions luxurious expenditure really promotes the economic interests of society. A GREAT MORALISING AGENT. Having thus disposed of the economist, Mr. Baldwin turns to the moralist : The arraignments of luxury on ethical grounds, when pared of emotional extravagances, may be reduced to these two propositions: first, luxury demoralises the individual, making him sensuous and self-indulgent; second, luxury wrongs the poor, through the waste of money that ought to have gone to charity. The ethical argument against luxury thus rests partly on an individualistic, partly on a socialistic, basis. The first of these propositions is a wild generalisation. It is not true that luxury per se is demoralising. All depends on the kind of luxury in question. The right sort of luxury refines the individual, enriches his life, and heightens his social efficiency. In the main, luxury has exhibited itself as a great moralising and civilising agent. NO ROBBERY OF THE POOR. On the second point, the writer argues :— The notion that there is necessarily any causal connection between opulence and poverty is too crude to require serious refutation. The wealth of society is not a fixed fund, of which, if one may get more than an equal share, someone else is bound to get proportionately less. It is rather a variable mass, which each individual can augment or diminish by his efficiency or inefficiency. If one man has more wealth than another, it is generally because either he or his ancestors have produced more. He is under no obligation to dole out his surplus. . . . Indeed, the man who spends wisely on luxuries does more substantia! good to society than the man who gives indiscriminately for charities. The former creates employment for labourers; the latter pauperises them. Even foolish extravagance is a lesser evil than reckless almsgiving. THE REAL CRUX. This argument that we have just been considering is really an arraignment of the existing system of distribution, not of luxury. So far as the argument has any force at all, it turns against the justice of the present distribution of wealth; it has no bearing on the expenditure of wealth. If the present system does not involve injustice, by giving too much to the capitalist and too little to the labourer, then it is a reform of the whole plan of distribution that is called for-not a mere readjustment of private expenditure. Mr. Baldwin thus arrives at the general principles, that In general, it may be laid down that a luxury which con tributes to the efficiency of the individual, in the widest sense, and which does not impose on society for the satisfaction of its demands an unwholesome and degrading form of labour, is perfectly justifiable. A MAIN FACTOR IN PROGRESS. The paper closes with the argument that, in the rela tion of luxury to progress in culture, luxury finds strongest justification: The luxuries of the few in one generation become the common heritage of the many in the next. For the lower classes, spurred by the example of the upper class, push on successively in their turn to a higher plane of civilisation. Thus the whole society advances, class-wise, from stage to stage. Luxury is a main factor in this onward movement of the race. It deepens and enriches the content of life. The desire for it furnishes a chief motive to social advancement. Without it existence would become a stagnant monotony. It stands for much of the beauty, grace and variety which alone make life really worth the living. WAGNER AND BEETHOVEN. IN November, 1897, there appeared in the Neue Deutsche Rundschau an interesting article on the symphony since Beethoven, by Felix Weingartner, the famous conductor. An English version of this article has now been prepared by Carl Armbruster for the Contemporary Review, and has duly been published in the February and March numbers. Wagner, says the writer, pours his keen satire on the symphony-writers since Beethoven; he is surprised that composers gaily go on writing symphonies, without becoming aware of the fact that the "last" symphony, Beethoven's Ninth, has already been written. Weingartner then proceeds to review the new classical school of composers, and says in conclusion : Herr Be it a little song or a great symphony which you compose, it will be a masterpiece only if it deserves the same motto which the great Beethoven wrote upon the score of his "Missa Solemnis ":" From the heart--may it go to the heart." In the current number of the Monthly Musical Record, Mr. Edward A. Baughan has a word to say on Herr Weingartner's article. He is disappointed because Herr Weingartner does not recognise sufficiently the modern developments of symphonic music : Certainly no greater word has been said than Beethoven uttered, but a review of symphonic efforts must not be bounded by the towering wall of the Bonn master's genius. Tru, the symphony-writers immediately following him-Schubert, Schu mann, and then Brahms-cannot for a moment be compared with Beethoven, but it is certainly wrong to infer that none of these men did anything for the symphony. 10 LABOURERS' ALLOTMENTS PAY? EARL CARRINGTON'S TESTIMONY. "THE Land and the Labourers" is the title of a very eering paper by Earl Carrington in the Nineteenth ntury. He finds before him the problem, "If farmers nnot pay a living wage, how can labourers' incomes be pplemented?" and he answers, "By giving them some nd for themselves." To convince the sceptical he relates s own experience, which he sums up as follows : My practical experience of over thirty years is that small ldings and allotments not only keep villagers on the land, but at they are and always have been a financial and social success. ith me they have succeeded not only round an artisan town, it equally on the clays of North and Mid Bucks, on the chalk lls and in the valleys of South Bucks, on the light lands and dinary soils of North and Mid Lincolnshire, and best of all 1 the grand land of the Lincolnshire fens. A HAPPY PARISH. Here is an idyllic picture : . ... The parish of Humberstone, in Lincolnshire, is part of the Carrington estate, and consists of two thousand seven hundred cres. The custom in this village has always been that three or aore acres of land go with most of the cottages. In Humberstone the labourers' children are healthy and well-fed, and the labourers are industrious, steady, hardy working men, vho have for themselves solved the problem of Old Age Pensions by their own savings from their little pieces of land and cows, and instead of about one hundred and fifty to two hundred pounds a year going from the village public-house to a brewer iving elsewhere, most of it is saved in the parish. Consequently there are no poor, and I do not know of an instance of any one of this parish going to the workhouse or receiving outdoor relief for years. LABOURERS ACCUMULATING CAPITAL. The writer offers as another proof that allotments pay, the applications made to the Holland County Council for small holdings: : In 1892 112 applications were made, and every one of the applicants possessed capital ranging from £10 to £100, which they had obtained by cultivating allotments :-A man who cultivated one and three-quarter acres was owner of five beasts and four pigs; a man who cultivated one acre was owner of a heifer and two pigs; a man who cultivated one and three-quarter acres was owner of two cows, pony and 100; a man who cultivated three acres was owner of four horses, two pigs and £100; a man who cultivated one acre was owner of two horses and £20; a man who cultivated one acre was owner of three pigs and 12; a man who cultivated one acre was owner of two pigs and £20; and so on. The money was certified as being in the Savings Bank or otherwise vouched for. and the live stock spoke for themselves. that SIXTY-FOUR TENANTS ON ONE FARM. The Willow Tree Farm in South Lincolnshire, of. 217 acres, was let out to a syndicate with sixty-four tenants instead of one, at the same rent as before, averaging 35s. an acre. The result after four years is the land is acknowledged to be in a higher state of cultivation than when the men entered upon it," and out of rents amounting to £1,250 less than £4 had been lost. The success is referred to the following four points : (1.) The men were all men who thoroughly understood the cultivation of the soil. (2.) They hired an acre first and made that a success before taking a larger quantity. They were men who had not been failures either in agriculture or other walks of life. (3.) The land was eminently adapted for small holdings; and (4) the rent was the average rent paid by the farmer of the district. HOW TO MAKE A FORTUNE. BY A MULTI-MILLIONAIRE. 66 MR. RUSSELL SAGE is, we are told, the wealthiest self-made millionaire in the world. With no other capital than his two hands, his head, and the position of errand boy in a country grocery shop, this well-known New York man of money has amassed a fortune of over £20,000,000 (100,000,000 dollars)." He is "perhaps the greatest railroad financier in the world, and controls over forty railroads." He contributes to the Royal Magazine for March a paper on "The Secret of Making Money." He says: The secret of money-making is so simple that it can be mastered by any person of ordinary intelligence. It consists of nothing more difficult than the strict observance of a few common-sense rules. FIVE FOUNDATION RULES. There are five fundamental principles which must be laid down by every person starting out with the wish to have a successful career. These are: Honesty, temperance, patience, punctuality, and strict adhesion to fixed rules for his office and his home. There are other rules to be followed in different lines of work, but these five must invariably be followed in all cases. These five rules are the foundation rocks upon which every fortune must be erected, or else that fortune will be certain to some day totter to the ground. A man may sometimes make a sky-rocket fortune by neglecting strict business principles, but like Hooley and many other prominent examples his wealth will some day be suddenly swept away. THREE OTHER ESSENTIALS. To amass a big, permanent fortune in some business enterprise, every man must combine his strict adhesion to business principles with, first, a genuine liking for the work he has mapped out for himself; secondly, a clear, cool brain; and, thirdly, a bull-dog determination that he will overcome all obstacles that crop up from time to time. "Every business and profession is overcrowded," is the cry. It is, no doubt, true that there are more men in the field to-day than there were twenty-five years ago—at least, it is so in America; but, on the other hand, the field itself has been enlarging all the while. There is always lots of room at the top everywhere. THE BEST EDUCATION FOR A FORTUNE-HUNTER. I do not believe, generally speaking, that a college education will hurt any youth, but I do believe that in many cases it is so much trouble, time, and money thrown away. On one hand, if the boy wishes to become a lawyer, or a clergyman, or an author, there is no doubt about it that a college education will help him enormously to achieve success. But, on the other hand, if he intends to enter upon a business career I do not see how a college education is going to help him any. The kind of education that counts most of all is a common school education, supplemented by a habit of reading books of information, the newspapers and the magazines, in the hours of leisure. Put the boy to work when he gets through school, and let him do this reading in the evenings and on holidays. THE VALUE OF HONESTY. Mr. Sage says dishonesty may accumulate wealth more rapidly than honesty, but sooner or later the secret must leak out, and then "the man's happiness is at an end." He will be hated by the poor and despised by the rich : The trite old maxim that "Honesty is the best policy," is as true to-day as it was the day it was first uttered. Too much pleasure-seeking has more than any one other cause brought fortunes tumbling about the ears of their owners. It has nipped in the bud an enormous number of promising careers. Mr. Sage mentions a sympathetic and intelligent wife as another valuable auxiliary in the task of fortune building. He concludes :— Of course, everybody cannot become a millionaire. But it is in the power of every ambitious young man to, in time, increase his starting capital ten thousand fold. 66 MR. H. W. MACROSTY, writing on the Growth of Monopoly in British Industry in the Contemporary for March, does much to dispel the cheery confidence that "" trusts and "combines" were American contrivances fostered by protection and not likely to take root on British soil. The writer works to establish this conclusion: We see in British industry a steady movement towards combination and monopoly, a movement which is the natural outcome of competition, and therefore not capable of being prevented or undone by law. At one time it takes the form of the elimination of subordinate agents in production and distribution, at another of combinations or rings to regulate prices, at a third of the actual fusion of competing firms. The net result is a great improvement in productive organisation, which is balanced by the possibility that the new machinery may be turned against the consumer. IN THE RETAIL TRADE. He first traces the change in distribution, and says: The retail trade is to-day passing through an industrial revolution similar to that which manufactures experienced in the early years of this century, and the small shopkeeper is the analogue of the hand-loom weaver. Large businesses like Marshall and Snelgrove's, Peter Robinson's, Lipton's obtain an ever-increasing share of trade, for, among other reasons, a wellknown or well-advertised name is taken as a guarantee of quality. Establishments like the various " Stores," Whiteley's, Spiers and Ponds', and other "universal providers," where a number of different but co-ordinate businesses are congregated under the same roof, like so many markets, are a never-ceasing source of wonderment to visitors to London. The joint-stock company system has spread to distributive businesses. To the boom in breweries has succeeded a boom in groceries, and the capitalisation of stores and trading companies in the grocery, provision, meat, oil, and drug trades in the two years 1896-7 was over £18,000,000. Retailers have awakened to the fact that competition has reached the point where it is no longer profitable, and that combination is a more effective way of obtaining a steady income. In the grocery, tobacconist, chemist, and baking branches of the shop trades the traders are grouped into local trade associations of more or less strength, and these, again, are federated nationally. IN MANUFACTURES. These combinations have reacted on manufacturers, who being prevented by trade unions from recouping themselves by forcing down wages, are compelled in self-defence to combine as well : Single amalgamations, while not entirely excluding competition, control the screw, cotton, thread, salt, alkali, and indiarubber tyre industries. In other cases a formal or informal agreement of masters fixes prices; thus in the hollow-ware trade (metal utensils) prices are arranged by an informal ring of a dozen Birmingham firms. Similarly there is no open market in antimony, nickel, mercury, lead pipes, fish supply, and petroleum. Steel and iron rails are controlled by an English rail ring, which so manages matters that it is undersold by American, Belgian, and German competitors. All the largest firms in the newspaper making industry have just consolidated their interests into one large combination. In the engineering trade twenty-four firms have a subscribed capital of £14,245,000. In 1897 Armstrong an 1 Co. absorbed Whitworth and Co., raising their capital to £4,210,000 in the process. Vickers and Co., the armour-plate manufacturers, are another example of a very large amalgamation. In the spring of 1897 they bought up the Naval Con. struction and Armaments Co., and later they acquired the Maxim Nordenfeldt Guns and Ammunition Co. Now they boast of being the only firm capable of turning out a battleship complete in every respect. The most noteworthy examples of combination, however, are to be found in the Birmingham sta trades and in the textile industries. THE SEWING THREAD "COMBINE." In the cotton trade since 1897 "a perfect mania fe trusts has set in." The impulse came from the success combination in the sewing-thread industry. The firm J. and P. Coats, of Paisley, with a capital of £5,750,00 absorbed Kerr and Co. in 1895, and in 1895 amalgamat with Clarke and Co., of Paisley, Chadwick and Co., f Bolton, and Jonas Brook and Co., of Meltham, w £4,000,000 of fresh capital raised for the purpose. I 1897 fifteen firms amalgamated in the English Sew Cotton Co. with £2,000,000 share capital and £750.0% debentures. Messrs. Coats took £200,000 of ordinary shares : Since the formation of the company the large Glasgow fr of R. F. and J. Alexander, with a capital of £475,000, been absorbed. Latest of all, a huge combination of Americ sewing-thread manufacturers is announced, with a capital £3,720,000, and agreements have been entered into w Messrs. Coats and Co. and the English Sewing Cotton Comp to avoid undue competition in output and prices, the form company taking up 103,000 in shares and the latter £744.00 It must be only a matter of a short time before the few reme ing independent thread manufacturers in this country brought into one or other of the great combinations. IN THE COTTON TRADE. The cotton spinners have begun to follow suit: The Fine Cotton Spinners' and Doublers' Associati Limited, was registered on March 31st, 1898, with a str capital of £4,000,000 and £2,000,000 additional in debentars Seventeen firms of spinners, mostly in Manchester and Bolt and fifteen other firms of doublers are in the "combine." Further combinations, spoken of but not yet completed, are the coarse yarn spinners in Oldham, with a capital of £3,000,000 the linen yarn spinners in Belfast and the neighbourhood, w a capital of £4,000,000; and the jute manufacturers of Dunde with an estimated capital of £2,000,000. The total capit tion of the various bodies in the textile industry which are either combined, or whose union is in immediate prospect. 5 £28,000,000, and the limit is still far from being reached. "The latest and completest English trust" is said to be the Bradford Dyers Association, Limited, formed i December, 1898, embracing twenty-two firms with a capital of £4,500,000, and possessing 90 per cent. of the trade-" a practical monopoly." IN OTHER INDUSTRIES. The writer recalls Sir George Elliott's proposal in 1893 to amalgamate pretty well all collieries, and states that Mr. Ratcliffe Ellis, secretary of the Federated Coalowners of Yorkshire, Lancashire and the Midlands, has proposed that all coalowners form a limited company for the purchase and re-sale of their coal. In 1896 the seaborne coal trade of London passed under the control of W. Cory and Sons, Limited, which included eight large firms, handled five out of the eight millions of coal coming by sea to London, and had £2,000,000 share capital. The transport trades show similar tendencies, in omnibus, railway and shipping concerns. THE REMEDY. The real remedy for these monopolies which may be turned against the interest of the consumer is found by the writer in Parliamentary control. The paper concludes with the sanguine words :: With the weapon of State control in hand, combination may be welcomed, and if control prove insufficient, State purchase and public administration remain behind. HOUSING THE POOR IN BELGIUM. IN view of the burning question of the housing of the or which at present occupies the attention of the public, 1 article in the recent number of the Russkaia Misl Russian Thought ") on the improvement of workmen's wellings in Belgium may be of interest. OVERCROWDED BRUSSELS. Overcrowding in the large Belgian cities exists as much, erhaps, as in England. In the first district in Brussels, or instance, it was found that not less than five hundred nd seventy-eight working men's families occupied one ngle room each, and in seventeen cases the whole family ad only one bed. In the second district 1,429 families ccupied one room each, 196 having only one bed per amily. In the third district 401 families, and in the fourth 62 families were occupying single rooms; of these 7 and 116 respectively had only one bed each. These and similar facts evoked the activity of the Belgian Government and of society, and they began to ake various measures in order to fight against the evil. The Parliament soon passed new laws, among which that of 1889 has already greatly helped and will still help to improve the houses of the working people. According to that law one or more boards of guardians were formed in each district, whose duties consist of (1) aiding to build for, sell, or let to the working classes healthy houses for cash down or in annual instalments; (2) investigating everything concerning the sanitary condition of the houses occupied by workmen ; and (3) assisting in the development of savings banks and old age pension funds. THE WORK OF THE COMMITTEES. The boards of guardians who look after the sanitary condition of the houses draw the attention of the landlords to deficiencies in water supply, drainage, etc., and in case the landlords take no steps to comply with the indications of the board, the latter informs either the local police or the sanitary authorities, who take action against the landlords. The boards, or committees, as they are called in Belgium, also assist in the formation of savings banks, life insurance associations, old age pension funds, co-operative banks, etc. The committees communicate direct with the Government, provincial authorities, and local sanitary authorities. They consist of either five or eighteen members, according to the number of the population. A part of the members (3--10) are nominated by the towns and the remaining (2-8) by the Government. The law of 1889 permits the principal savings bank guaranteed by the State to grant loans to different companies which are engaged in building houses for the working people. The interest paid by the credit and co-operative societies is 2 per cent., and that paid by the building societies is 3 per cent. WORKMEN'S LOANS. The credit societies, who have a right to borrow from the principal savings bank, must grant loans only to those workmen who desire to build or purchase a house for their own accommodation. The credit society in this case is acting more as an adviser, because the workman has the right to select ground and build the house according to his own taste. The credit societies must not be of a speculative character, and their dividends must not be higher than 3 per cent. In order to obtain loans from the savings bank the societies have in the first instance to apply to the local committee of guardians. The same rule applies to the working people who wish to obtain loans from the credit societies. The latter have no right to build, sell, or to let houses. All that is in the hands of the building societies, whose dividends are not limited. The cost of the house built or acquired with the aid of the credit societies must not be higher than 5,500 francs (220 sterling). The workman has to pay one-tenth part of the cost himself, the credit society gives three-tenths, and the savings bank the rest. The repayment of loans to the credit societies and savings bank is made by weekly, fortnightly or monthly instalments in ten, fifteen, twenty or twenty-five years, according to the contract. A FURTHER ADVANCE. The Belgian law of 1893 supplementing the one of 1889 releases the houses of the working classes from any personal or ground taxes, governmental or local. This privilege applies only to houses inhabited by their proprietors themselves, whose income from letting a part of the house does not exceed from 72 to 171 francs per annum, according to the number of inhabitants in the district. From this short expounding of the Belgian laws of 1889 and 1893 one can see that the committees of guardians created by these laws are a very important and useful instrument for the bettering of the workmen's dwellings. Their influence can be seen everywhere; in creating building and credit societies, in inspecting houses and whole quarters inhabited by the poor, and in advising the local authorities and the Government. THE WORKING MAN TO-DAY. Thanks to the credit societies and savings bank an honest and hard-working man, who has saved about 200 francs (8), can purchase a house worth 2,000 francs (£80). Life insurance gives him the opportunity of providing for his family in case of death. The long term fixed for repayment of the loans greatly facilitates the fulfilment of his contract. The provisions of the law of 1889 clearly show that the law tends to ameliorate the condition of the true hard-working man, whose life and health are specially precious to every country. In order to get a loan for building or purchase of a house the workman must be laborious, honest and sparing. The Belgian law offers a splendid example as a legislative measure for the bettering of the present conditions of the poorer classes in every country. Curious Currency in the Carolines. MR. F. W. CHRISTIAN contributes to the February Geographical Journal a very interesting illustrated paper on exploration in the Caroline Islands. Among other strange arrangements of the islanders, he calls attention to the peculiar coinage or medium of exchange in Yap :-First and foremost comes the stone money, which consists of quartzen wheels, varying from 6 to 8 inches to 12 feet in diameter, which form a most unwieldy medium of exchange. A man who had extensive business debts to meet or cash payments to make would need some ten yoke of bullocks and a waggon to transport his specie. Generally speaking, however, these stones are more for show and ornament than for use. The village club-houses are called Fe-bai, or stone money houses, from the wheels of stone which rest against their walls. In any of the settlements these great discs or wheels may be seen leant up against the walls or terraces of the houses of the Madangadang, or plutocrat class, which here, as elsewhere, enjoys considerable distinction in the national councils. A perfect pair of large shells, the valves of the pearl oyster, are also highly valued and used for money. The smaller specimen of pearl-shell threaded upon strings of hibiscous fibre or cinnet, about twenty on a line, used to be used as small change. In these days, however, bags of copra or dried cocoanut kernel are employed as a medium of exchange. THE DOOM OF THE TALL CHIMNEY. THE tall chimney is doomed. That hideous excrescence of modern industry is destined to extinction. Such is the good news conveyed in a paper which Mr. Walter B. Snow contributes to Cassiers for November. He shows not merely that the requisite draught can be secured by other means, but that these means are ever so much less expensive and more satisfactory. It is the old story over again. The wounds inflicted by machinery only machinery can heal. The forest of chimney stalks with its horrible foliage of smoke is one of the injuries we owe to mechanical progress: its cure is to be more mechanical progress. The hollow pillars of brick or stone have been so long accepted as to be spoken of as the means of the "natural draught"; but now the hour of the "mechanical draught" has come. It is not necessary to go into the details of the "forced" draught or plenum method, and of the "induced" draught or vacuum method: or to describe how the artificial draught makes the combustion more complete. That mechanical appliances can do away with the need for long chimneys may readily ba admitted. The question of importance is, Can the thing be done on commercial principles? To answer this question, Mr. Snow selects a plant of reasonable size, of which the detailed cost is known : This plant consists of eight modern water-tube boilers, each of 200 horse-power. A chimney is provided, 8 feet in internal diameter and 180 feet high, of sufficient capacity to overcome the resistance of the two-feed water economisers and produce the draught necessary for any probable forcing of the boilers. This is the old method; but In the other plan there are two fans, each driven by a separate engine. Each fan is capable of independently producing the draught for the entire plant, and thus serves as a relay, if desired. Such an apparatus, with the short stack, can be installed complete, under ordinary conditions, for about 3,500 dols. (£700). The total economy in first cost effected by the introduction of the mechanical draught plant, which amounts to a reduction of about 62 per cent., may be indicated as follows; the saving of space occupied by the chimney being neglected : 9.925 dols. (£1.985) to be credited to the account of s mechanical method. Of course, the fixed charges for inte taxes and insurance will be correspondingly reduced. Had comparison be based upon the cost of a plenum or for draught plant, the saving in the cost would have been short be even greater because of the smaller fan required. The value of the land may be an important factor in cost. If figured at 2 dols. (8s.) per square foot, for inst the omission of the chimney would in this case save goo (198), and the reduction in the number of boilers, good (192) on the cost of the land required for the plant. The total net saving in first cost of a single plant, under t given conditions, may be thus summarised : By omission of chimney and damper $11,875-00 This total saving is made possible by the expenditure of gre dols. (£700) for the mechanical draught apparatus; that kn saving is nearly three and one-half times the expenditure se sary to secure it. The reduction of 11,875 dols. (£2,375) 2 cost would indicate an annual saving in fixed charges of th 831 dols. (£166) to 890 dols. (£178), according as the age of interest, taxes and insurance is taken at 7 or 7 per cent To these solid economic advantages are added t greater convenience, the readier adaptability, the indepe dence of weather, and the increase at will of the new draught. Furthermore, it can consume a much infere kind of fuel and thus effect a further saving. WHO KILLED LORD RAGLAN? ADMIRAL MAXSE writes in the March National "Lord Raglan's Traducers." His object is "to rub some of the tarnish which dims the lustre of Lord Raglan's reputation." He is outspoken and direct. He says: No general was ever so ill-treated by the Press as was Led Raglan when he commanded the British Army in the Crime, the Press in this case meaning The Times newspaper and Mr. William Howard Russell, its correspondent at the seat of war With Mr. Kinglake he finds a partial explanation in the fact that "Mr. Russell was entirely ignored by Lord Raglan and the Headquarter Staff. I am not aware that he attempted to have an interview with any of its members. All he did was to abuse them The worst was to come. The Times had so poisoned the public mind by its reckless accusations and exaggerated statements, that Cabinet Ministers became infected, and the states men who should have kept their heads during the popul delirium allowed themselves to be carried away by it, and changed their attitude towards the Commander-in-Chief whom they were bound to support. Yet when "the solemn national inquests" were held, at home and in the Crimea, the assailed officers were absolved from blame: the home administration was alone found to be culpable. Speaking of Lord Raglan's death, the writer exclaims :-— Yes-he was done to death! Not done to death as he might so often have been by the enemy's bullet or shell, but done to death by his calumniators. Some of these were anonymous and hid under Anonymity, others escaped behind Collective Responsibility. These two culprits can never be run to bay, All we can say is that Lord Raglan was shamefully slandered by The Times newspaper, and, that, as a consequence, he was deserted by his Government, and insulted by the Secretary of State for War. We owe Admiral Maxse an apology for inadvertently stating last month that the "two chiefs in the Crimea" whose fair fame he was vindicating were Admiral Dundas and Sir Edmund Lyons, instead of Sir Edmund Lyons and Lord Raglan. 1 |