Page:On the economy of machinery and manufactures - Babbage - 1846.djvu/359

Rh at the subscription price, he proves, by the very fact, that he himself does not estimate that risk at more than from four to eight per cent.

(393.) It has been truly observed, on the other hand, that many copies of books are spoiled by persons who enter the shops of booksellers without intending to make any purchase. But, not to mention that such persons finding on the tables various new publications, are frequently induced, by that opportunity of inspecting them, to become purchasers: this damage does not apply to all booksellers nor to all books; of course it is not necessary to keep in the shop books of small probable demand or great price. In the present case, the retail profit on three copies only, namely, 4s. 6d., would pay the whole cost of the one copy soiled in the shop; and even that copy might afterwards produce, at an auction, half or a third of its cost price. The argument, therefore, from disappointments in the sale of books, and that arising from heavy stock, are totally groundless in the question between publisher and author. It should be remarked also, that the publisher is generally a retail, as well as a wholesale, bookseller; and that, besides his profit upon every copy which he sells in his capacity of agent, he is allowed to charge the author as if every copy had been subscribed for at 4s. 2d., and of course he receives the same profit as the rest of the wholesale traders for the books retailed in his own shop.

(394.) In the country, there is more reason for a considerable allowance between the retail dealer and the public; because the profit of the country bookseller is diminished by the expense of the carriage