Page:Blackwood's Magazine volume 137.djvu/542

538 not aid the consumer at all. Rather there is no healthy competition, for the retail sellers are able to combine and overbear all attempts to offer the goods at a lower rate. It was for a time hoped that the co-operative societies might prevail to break the power of what are really great conspiracies against the interests of the public; but they have hitherto accomplished little as regards fresh provisions.

The evil is one very difficult to contend with, notwithstanding that we are able to see pretty clearly where the unsound place is. Catches of fish are parted with by the toilers of the sea for extremely moderate considerations; foreign grain and foreign carcasses are brought hither and sold at decidedly cheap rates, – and yet the buyer for his own table finds his retail purchase singularly dear. Now that these facts are known, it is probable that in time we may see the obstacles to fair dealing in the food of the people cleared away. So far, even though they are known, the facts obtain much less attention than they deserve. Compare the protests made by the public against the conspirators who keep up the retail prices of food, with the indignation which clamours so loudly if one only hints at such a thing as a protective duty; and yet the duty would enhance the price very far less than these combinations do. The duties are made odious to serve political objects; but it benefits no party to denounce the action of middlemen and retailers, and so their overthrow is left to time. Time, probably, will not fail us. After long waiting the public has at length had some right done it in the article of household fuel, and this gives ground for hope that right will some day triumph in respect of provisions.

Nothing could look more hopeless than the high price of household coal did in the south of England a few years ago. Now it has become, rather suddenly, more moderate – the means having been found, after long waiting, of outflanking the destructive army of middlemen, and of bringing the colliery owner and the consumer into direct relation. An intermediate business, which for long enriched a few tradesmen, has been, or soon will be, eliminated; on the other hand, the population at large experience a marked relief in regard to an indispensable commodity. To the poor in winter, the boon of moderately priced coal must be inexpressibly welcome.

The word price has formed a link between ideas which, at first view, have little in common. I pass from the price of commodities to the price of men.

What Walpole said about every man having his price, seems to be in these days applicable to persons in the employ of the State, who are intrusted with information or documents which it is their duty to keep secret. Every now and then occasions come about when it is worth the while of certain persons to pay highly for such information or documents, in order that they may make the same public; and it too often happens that public servants who have not the excuse of necessity or low wages to plead, yield to the temptation of a heavy bribe. It is no unusual thing for us to read in print some of the proceedings of Councils and Committees, which every one officially aware of them has been bound to keep secret: this remark applies to times when such proceedings may not be the subjects of great public curiosity or interest. But again, there are times when very much anxiety is felt concern-