Germany for twelve cents, and anywhere in France for ten cents; while here it costs twenty-five cents to send a telegram from one point in Massachusetts to another point in Massachusetts, and the same thing is true in New York, Pennsylvania, and each of the other States.

The average receipt per message runs from eight cents to fifteen cents in European countries, while it is thirty-one cents here. The Western Union says it is distance the average distance per message is twice as great here. Well, that does not explain the difference between fifteen and thirty-one, for, according to Western Union statements of the cost of maintenance, the whole cost due to distance is under three cents a message, so that one and one-half cents would cover the cost due to excess of distance here. Then the Western Union says it is wages-the high wages paid by the Western Union; but it is in evidence that telegraph wages are lower here than in Europe, so that will not do. Moreover, the efficiency of labor in the Western Union is slightly greater than in Great Britain or on the Continent-more messages per employee here.† The explanation of the charges in America is private monopoly profit, part of which goes into big salaries, not reported, and into new construction, sometimes reported and sometimes put down to operating expenses.

*

*According to the Tenth Census, volume 4, the average telegraph salary in the United States for 1872 was $360, against $288 in Europe, and in 1880 the average telegraph salary was $327 in the United States and $320 in Europe, showing a large increase in Europe and a fall in the United States. In view of the facts that further reductions were made in the United States, causing the great telegraph strike of 1883, that the company won the strike and have continued their policy of wage reduction (Senate Doc. 65, Fifty-sixth Congress, first session, pp. 38, 39, and authorities there cited), that English wages are above the general European level, and that the British reports show a rise of telegraph wages from 55 per cent. of the total expenditures in 1881 to 65 per cent. in 1895 (the last report I have in which I find this item dealt with), and from 44 per cent. of telegraph receipts in 1880 to 67 per cent. in 1899, while since 1881 the hours have been reduced in England from 56 per week to 48 day and 42 night. In view of all these facts it seems clear that the average telegraph wage is higher now in Great Britain than in the United States, this roundabout method being the only one available since the average telegraph wage in this country is not attainable.

† Sen. Doc. 65, 56th Cong., 1st session, pp. 18 and 19, note 3, giving facts from the Tenth Census, volume 4.

Vice-president Clark recently compared the charges from London to various points on the Continent with the rates from New York to other places in the United States, and contrasted the cost of 21 words here with the cost of sending 21 words in Europe, claiming that the cost was not so much greater here. I suggest, however, that the vice-president's comparison of American rates from New York with European rates from London are invalid: (1) Because the American rates are internal, while the European are international, the messages passing through two, three, and four countries, each of which adds its tariff; (2) because the American rates are land rates, while each of the European routes include the cable from England to the Continent, and, as Mr. Clark admits, in answer to a question later in his testimony, the cable service is "infinitely" more costly than the land service.

I suggest further that all his rate comparisons are vitiated by his assumption of II words as the average of address and signature, making 21 words to the ordinary message as a basis of comparison. In the first place, the addition of 11 words as the average for address and signature is not justified by experience, or by Western Union testimony in the past. President Green, of the Western Union, some years ago placed the average number of words in address and signature at 7 per message.* In the second place, even if the average ordinary message here were 21 words the comparison would not fairly present the situation, for, whatever may be the case here, it is perfectly certain that the average message in England is not 21 words, but about 15 words.

The vital matters are the minimum rates at which messages can be sent, and the actual average charge; for these are the things that in connection with the extension of facilities really govern the use of the telegraph, and give the English people about double the per capita use of the wires that we attain. A few words more or less to the message is of comparatively little consequence, but the ordinary minimum rate at which any message may be sent determines the strata of the population

* See Senate Doc. 65, Fifty-sixth Congress, first session, p. 14.

that can afford to use the telegraph and the frequency of its use by the whole middle class.

The vice-president says that the Baltimore and Ohio telegraph (which maintained a 10-cent rate on 19 long routes and other low rates averaging 161⁄2 cents a message on the whole system) became bankrupt in consequence of its low tariff. But Mr. D. H. Bates, who was manager of the Baltimore and Ohio telegraph system, testified at the Bingham hearings* that the Baltimore and Ohio made a profit in spite of its low rates, and that the Western Union succeeded in buying up the Baltimore and Ohio lines, not because they proved unprofitable, but because disaster overtook the road in other departments, and it sold its telegraph business as the most available source of realizing the funds necessary to right itself.

At the annual meeting of the National Board of Trade, in January, 1888, R. W. Dunham of Chicago described the operations of a telegraph company doing business between Milwaukee and Chicago, and of which Mr. Dunham was a stockholder. The company began with a charge of one cent a word, and within two years paid back to the stockholders ninety per cent. of the money they had paid in. Then they reduced the rate to one-half a cent a word, or five cents a message, and, after deducting expenses and seven per cent. on the capital, paid back to the patrons of the line a surplus of over forty per cent. on the entire business. This went on for two years, and then we "doubled our stock from $14,000 to $28,000, making it one-half water, and still the result is about the same, and from twenty-five to forty per cent. is still paid back on the five cents a message paid by patrons."+

* House Committee on Post Office, hearings in reference to the Wanamaker bill, 1890. The following are examples of the Baltimore and Ohio tariff: New York to Portland, Me., and intermediate points, 10 cents; New York to Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington, 10 cents; New York to Chicago, 15 cents; New York to St. Louis, 20 cents; to New Orleans, 50 cents; to Galveston, Tex., 75 cents. average charge on all messages was 162 cents (Bingham Hearings, pp. 21, 62, 76, and Senate Doc. 65, Fifty-sixth Congress, first session, p. 21).

The

Wanamaker's Argument on the Postal Telegraph, 1890, pp. 69 and 70, and Bingham Hearings, House Com. on Post-Office, 1890, page 25.

A COUPLE OF CAPITALISTS.

A STORY.

BY ELEANOR H. PORTER.

On the top of the hill stood the big brick house-a mansion, compared to the other houses of the little New England village. At the foot of the hill nestled the tiny brown farmhouse, half buried in lilacs, climbing roses, and hollyhocks.

Years ago, when Reuben had first brought Emily to that little brown cottage, he had said to her, ruefully: "Sweetheart, 'tain't much of a place, I know, but we'll save and save, every cent we can get, and by and by we'll go up to live in the big house on the hill!" And he kissed so tenderly the pretty little woman he had married only that morning that she smiled brightly and declared that the small brown house was the very nicest place in the world.

But, as time passed, the "big house" came to be the Mecca of all their hopes, and penny by penny the savings grew. It was slow work, though, and to hearts less courageous the thing would have seemed an impossibility. No luxuries-and scarcely the bare necessities of life-came to the little house under the hill, but every month a tiny sum found its way into the savings bank. Fortunately, air and sunshine were cheap, and, if inside the house there was lack of beauty and cheer, outside there was a riotous wealth of color and bloom-the flowers under Emily's loving care flourished and multiplied.

The few gowns in the modest trousseau had been turned inside out and upside down, only to be dyed and turned and twisted all over again. But what was a dyed gown, when one had all that money in the bank and the big house on the hill in prospect! Reuben's best suit grew rusty and seedy, but the man patiently, even gleefully, wore it as long as it would hang

together; and when the time came that new garments must be bought for both husband and wife, only the cheapest and flimsiest of material was purchased-but the money in the bank grew.

Reuben never smoked. While other men used the fragrant weed to calm their weary brains and bodies, Reuben-ate peanuts. It had been a curious passion of his, from the time when as a boy he was first presented with a penny for his very own, to spend all his spare cash on this peculiar luxury; and the slow munching of the somewhat plebeian delicacy had the same soothing effect on him that a good cigar or an old clay pipe had upon his brother-man. But from the day of his marriage all this was changed; the dimes and the nickels bought no more peanuts, but went to swell the common fund.

3

It is doubtful if even this heroic economy would have accomplished the desired end had not a certain railroad company cast envious eyes upon the level valley and forthwith sent long arms of steel bearing a puffing engine up through the quiet village. A large tract of waste land belonging to Reuben Gray suddenly became surprisingly valuable, and a sum that trebled twice over the scanty savings of years grew all in a night.

One crisp October day, Mr. and Mrs. Reuben Gray awoke to the fact that they were a little under sixty years of age, and in possession of more than the big sum of money necessary to enable them to carry out the dreams of their youth. They began joyous preparations at once.

The big brick house at the top of the hill had changed hands twice during the last forty years, and the present owner expressed himself as nothing loth to part, not only with the house itself, but with many of its furnishings; and before the winter snow fell the little brown cottage was sold to a thrifty young couple from the neighboring village, and the Grays took up their abode in their new home.

“Well, Em'ly, this is livin', now, ain't it?" said Reuben, as he carefully let himself down into the depths of a velvet-covered chair in the great parlor. "My! ain't this nice!"