The home journal. (Winchester, Tenn.) 1858-188?, 1872-05-09
COMMERCE AS A PURSUIT.


l III III vi
| voung men. l propose TO give instead
the reasons which seem to me conclu-
| sive for choosing some other calling
| than that of merchant. They are "
follows:
I. Trade Is already enormously over
done. We have at least twice as many
merchants of all grades and varieties
now soliciting custom and seeking 10
live and thrive by traffic as we need or
ear well afford to maintain. Com
merce levies q heavy tax Oh industry,
yet thousands of merchants lail, De-
cause there Is not room for so many.
A hundred farmers in middling cir
cunstances cannot afford to pay three
or four divers mercantile concerns for
selling and sending away their surplus
produce and supplying them with dry
goods and groceries, seeds anu lmple-
ments, in return.
In short, the machinery of trade Is
already too complicated, cumbrous,
costly. 1t must be rendered less so. In
other words, we do net want more eX-
changers of products, but fewer. We
want the necessary work OF buyers
and sellers for grain done at far less
cost than we are now paying. we
want to dispense at once with hall the
now existing mercantile concerns, and
ultimately with ut least half of the
residue. We want to increase pr0duc-
ton by making at least nineteen out OF
every twenty able-bodied men actual
producers Of wealth whereas, not
fifteen of every twenty are such.
Hence / say, No more merchants! We
have far too many, rs we haye too
many seeking to live by theprofessions
Theology, Law, Medicine.
III. Let no II say that | disparage
either trade or the professions. We
need merchants, as we need lawyers,
doctors, clergymen; we could not well
do without them. Many CT our pres
ent merchants are among our best and
most useful citizens. The question |
raise is not, EDO we need merchants?"
but, "Do we need more of them than
we already have? Could not a con-
siderably smaller number effect our
exchanges for US far cheaper and more
to our advantage than the present
Or " luESST Hullibti w VI ''h icii"Ci "
that service" Let Us keep to the
question.
III Forty years ago, when ! first
came to New York, every third or
intelligent youth in this city
to achieve wealth and position
by selling dry goods; now, not one IN
OF that class cherishe5 any such
aspirations.
Far more dry goods are now sold here
than then were, but 10y far fewer per-
in proportion to the amount sold.
A. II. Stewart, it is current assertion,
has !ruined the dry goods business by
mouopolizing II large share of it. In
plain terms, more goods are sold and
distributed through one immense con-
now, than We're in 1881 by amy
or thirty of the heaviest dry
goods houses of that day. The con-
sumers OF dry goods are better served at
lower charges than they We're forty
years ago. A thousand. persons now
efectthe exchanges that then required
rom five to ten thousand and this is
the ruin of the dry goods trade.
[ regard it rather as an improvement Of
hat trade, whereby the public. tina
ally a gamer. Mr.. StewaS which
master spirit of u great, Which will ha
ne will not perfect, hEves it, and car
.aHehh a "4 wfasiriiher 1t may perhaps be
aid or MIN as of many others, '"uY
ullded better than he kr-" put
hat is immaterial. rhe coral insect
his work as perfectly as though
e were a~ssiduously intent on the for :
Va ion of new islands; which weknow ,
niles fro0e a little farm thirty-iive
xhereon / gros heart of this city,
rhey bring me oneice apples lor SAFE ;,
ess than fifty cents per- WIN an'tne
am but two hours ride Pei thougn
he greatest markets in Ah.oie Vi
1ropaDly the largest apple markeS"
he globe. If any II would RESPONSE
bly, contract to take for the next ten
years all | would grow ut fifty cents
per bushel, | should be glad to make
the contract; yet those who consume
these very apples in this city pay at
east thrice fifty cents per bushel for
them in the average, and thousands
habitually do without who would glad
|y have them ut u price based upon
which | should be glad to take.
But the existing machinery of ex-
change and distribution is SO imperfect
and vicious that thousands of bushels
Of the apples growing within fifty
miles Of our City Hall rot under the
or are fed to swine, while those
who should eat them go with.
out apples, being unable TO pay the
prices at which they are held AID re-
at city stalls and groceries. Add
u thousand to the number who now
seek to live by buying apples in the
country and selling them in the city,
and you would probably Increase the
average city retail price rather than re-
duce it.
V. By-and-by, we shall, | trust, have
q better system. Perhaps, a great
stock company, raising or construct
ing the very best si0rehou!es for fruit
and vegetables Of all kinds, will buy
them of the growers so fast rs they are
fit to harvest and garner them in vast
warehouses of a low, uniform lempera-
ture, until the moment shall have ar
rived for throwing them respectively
on the market.
This company may send its laden
carts to every citizens door each
morning prOllering him an assert
ment of its ~seasonable products in
small quantities at not more than fifty
per cent. in advance on their cost by
the car load or the boat load when
bought of the farmers; or the farmers
may organize Il system of proflering
their products to the citizens at their
several doors at p,ices which will
only assure them a fair remuneration
for their labor; and the new system
may differ radically from either and
from both of these. | care not for the
means so that the end he honestly at
tanned.
All that seek to show here and now,
is that the true, beneiicent system will
require and employ far fewer hands to
achieve results substantially identical