Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 51.djvu/45

Rh that certain oculists," says the president of the New York State Optical Society, disclosing the bitter spirit that animates these two classes of "philanthropists" and "benefactors," "have elected to assault even skilled opticians by calling them quacks, charlatans, and fiery-eyed ignoramuses, we are certainly justified in refuting their allegations in a more gentlemanly and professional way." Finally came the smothered conflict between the "dispensing opticians" and the "refracting opticians," who, although united for relentless war on the oculists, have widely divergent notions as to the character and limits of their own professional skill.

The same belligerent spirit exists between the plumbers and kindred trades. "A practical plumber, one who is concerned about elevating his profession," says a report from Delaware, "finds it exceedingly difficult in the small towns to compete with the tinsmith and hardware men." The same complaint comes from Kentucky. "Nearly all of the plumbing in the smaller towns," it says, is "done by tinners, hardware men, machinists, and even 'nigger' blacksmiths." Could anything be more provocative of indignation and resistance in men possessed of a high spirit and noble aims? Afflicted as the feudal corporations were with illegitimate competition, they did not have to meet upon the field of honorable labor the ignoble rivalry of "niggers." The vice-president of the Oregon Association mentions as a particularly flagrant example of the unfair competition that the "honest plumber," one "concerned about elevating his profession," has to struggle against, a firm that advertises "Hardware, stoves, and ranges, sanitary plumbing, tin and sheet-iron work, groceries, provisions, and cord wood." "And still," he adds, as though recounting a miracle, but showing that honest work may be done without laws and ordinances, "these parties do a good job of plumbing." Passing from the country to the city, where the evolution of industry has gone further and the lines that separate one trade or profession from another have become more distinct, the conflicts between plumbers and other occupations are more bitter and relentless. A stone mason is not permitted to build a drain under a house nor connect it with the sewer. Without the risk of arrest and prosecution a steam or gas fitter can not put in a water or waste pipe. To the hardware man is denied