at any time by the addition of similar halls. Beside the railroad a special hall for loading and unloading is to be erected into which to bring goods arriving by rail destined for immediate shipment away without burdening the market-hall itself with them. It is connected with the market-hall by a covered street, and can also be used for the market as well as the street itself. Over the storage house are situated the offices of the management and those of the wholesalers. The plans are nearly finished and will soon be laid before the appropriate city authorities for voting the money. The market-hall in the old town is to remain as a storage-hall.

Influence of Markets Upon the Determination of Prices

The influence of the weekly markets, especially of the wholesale markets, upon the determination of prices is many sided. It may be followed up in three directions. Firstly, it is founded upon the market itself in the centralizing of regulation of supply and demand; secondly, in the lessening of expenses; and finally in the protection of the wares against injury and in their preservation.

Facilitating Supply

The more narrowly the market is centralized, the more clearly it is arranged, the easier demand and supply can be inspected. Nothing stands more in the way of a regulated fixing of prices than the splitting up of the markets. Centralization and clear arrangement are therefore of the first importance. Of course provision must be made that the law of supply and demand be effective without hindrance. Therefore it is in the first place necessary that the market should have enough room to take in at any time new producers and traders. Opportunity must also be given lessees of stands to increase their business with increasing needs, which at the same time helps to increase supply. If the hall is too small, there arise around the market-place, as one may see in many cities, private markets that make a general view of supply more difficult and injure the market. A further consequence of lack of space is the danger of the forming of rings among the wholesalers. Through the coming in of new competition the creation of rings is made more difficult. From this point of view the natural contrast between wholesaler and producer is also of weight. Even when trade in the larger markets plays an important and in

creasing part, nevertheless the producers even today constitute an important factor in the supply of the market and by bringing the two groups together, a ring among the traders is made much more difficult. It is therefore a wise thing to favor as far as possible the producers and also to have regard to their necessities. It must be noticed in this connection that the producers visit the market mostly only during the harvest, in all about five to six months in the year, and that it does not pay for most of them to hire stands and space for the whole year since in this way their wares are made disproportionally dear. It therefore seems wise to keep space ready for them even although from the financial point of view it will be more advantageous to rent the space for the whole year.

Of unusual importance for the regulation of supply and demand are city-selling agents, who should not be lacking in any market of importance. These produce agents are licensed by the market authorities. The conduct of their business is ruled by regulations and guarded by the market authorities. They have wares that come to them from distant, especially from foreign, producers, for whose account they sell them on the market at the best possible price. The charges that are allowed them for their efforts are fixed by the market authorities. They are obliged to give security that their principals are not injured. For their business, bureaus and storerooms are at their service. As a result of all these guarantees the city-selling agents enjoy universal confidence. They tend to regulate supply and demand in that they take care that the market at all times is sufficiently supplied and any gaps in supply filled out. In large markets several city-selling agents are always busy. Thus in the Berlin central market-hall there is a special selling agent for fruit and vegetables, a second for game and poultry, a third for fish. Selling agents do business only as wholesalers, either at private sale or at auction. Special use is made of auctions in case of goods that are in danger of quick injury. The goods secure in this way as a rule, it is true, smaller prices than at private sale, but find quicker sale for cash, so that less loss for spoiled goods occurs and the principal in spite of the cheaper prices, as a general thing, brings the same amount as in private sale. It is clear that the policy of allowing city-selling agents is not agreeable to traders and producers; still nothing remains for them but to do the best they can with the arrangement, which indeed gives them an advantage, in so far as it brings business to the market. It attracts

proprietors of hotels and so forth as well as purchasers from the neighboring cities, who to a large extent also make their other purchases in the market-hall.

The setting up of facilities for the storage of supplies, for instance refrigerating, cooling, warming and storage-cellars also tends towards the regulation of supply, especially as they furnish the possibility of a quick provision, in cases of great concourses of men, like public festivities.

Lessening of Expenses

The lessening of expenses plays an important part in the regulation of prices in the case of market goods as everywhere else. As has been above stated, in accordance with the "Gewerbeordnung," business on the market can in no case be burdened with any other charges except those for payment for the room given up, and the use of booths, tools, etc. In this provision of law there is a certain guarantee that the expenses on the market that must be met by the sellers shall be as small as possible. Of course the charges for stands in the market-halls cannot be so small as on an open market that does not require any special capital. It must be noted that the city authorities do not regard market-halls as undertakings for obtaining the greatest possible profit, but as provisions for the public welfare, and are contented that they pay their own expenses without requiring additional payments. Charges for the use of spurtracks, cooling, refrigerating and other storerooms, as a general thing, are not higher than is necessary to cover cost of the plant, its repairs, interest and repayment of the original capital. In any case the charges that must be paid in public market-halls are considerably less than rents for stores and storerooms in equally good positions in the city. An important part in the lessening of the expenses is played by the spurtracks as the transportation of the provisions is made in this way much cheaper than by their transportation between rail and market-hall by wagon. Of special importance also are the arrangements that make it possible to bring the wares in the quickest and simplest manner to the storerooms, because in that way wages are saved. From this point of view elevators must be so fitted up that an entire car with goods may be loaded upon them, so that they may leave direct from the elevator; also slides, inclined planes or spirals upon which the wares without any further effort slide down into the lower rooms are important.

Preservation of the Goods

That the protection of market goods against injury is of importance in the regulation of prices needs no explanation; since most of these goods are easily injured or spoiled. The less the waste in this way, the less that must be reckoned as part of trade costs in the selling price. The avoiding of transshipment is in itself of importance in the preservation of the goods. From this point of view also it is most expedient that the wares should come in the freight cars immediately in front of the hall, and from there be brought by wheelbarrows to the place of sale, the room where they are unpacked or the storage room. Also the construction of the hall is of importance for the preservation of the wares. A hall of iron with sheet iron roof is little suited for market plant since it does not offer enough protection from heat and cold. Three requirements are to be made in this respect of the building: good ventilation, use of material that keeps out heat and cold, heating arrangements in order to heat the hall in winter sufficiently to prevent the entrance of frost. For the flower trade it is wise to have a special department that is shut off from the remaining part of the hall and is heated independently.

Finally of a special importance for the preservation of the wares are the storage rooms: for fruit, potatoes, cabbages and so forth, cool, well-aired cellars must be provided; easily injured goods like eggs, butter, cheese, meat, fish must have cooling and refrigerating rooms. Bananas require rooms with simple arrangements for heating, in order that they may be slowly or more quickly ripened. For the different articles separate divisions in the cooling and refrigerating rooms are necessary, since the temperature for the best preservation of the goods in the cooling rooms is different for the different articles, and the goods, if stored together, easily acquire the smell one of the other. In recent times cooling and refrigerating rooms are very generally provided with ozone plants that serve for improving the air in these rooms, and for the preservation of the articles stored there.

I have described in a general way the markets in Germany. In America things are different. In the different branches of public and economic life the development causes changes in the provision of supplies from the methods in Germany. Nevertheless the above. description will not be without interest for those who are living under American conditions.

THE LONG ISLAND HOME HAMPER

BY H. B. FULLERTON,

Director Agricultural Development, Long Island Railroad Company,
Medford, Long Island.

Up to 1905, I along with others was a consumer belonging to the city flat-dwelling tribe. In 1906 we became producers, in charge of the Long Island Railroad's Experimental Stations, casting our lot with those of the market garden profession.

As soon as the results of our labor reached the salable stage we were confronted with and astounded by the remarkable changes in food undergone during the transmission between the producer and consumer. We gathered peas crisp, vivid in color and of wonderful sweetness; we remembered yellowed, shriveled, flavorless semblances we purchased as flat-dwellers. We gathered sugar corn that lived up to its name to the very limit. We cut lettuce, crisp and with cabbage-like heads of greenish tinted whiteness. We remembered that in the city we were unable to buy at any price corn that had the slightest hint of sweetness; and that the lettuce we obtained was flabby and tough and required foreign mixtures to make it edible. We raised strawberries, large and luscious, as sweet as those wild berries of which poets long have sung. Celery we grew, whose stringless, brittle stalk forced us to use great care in gathering this sweet-flavored appetizer. Cantaloupes and watermelon we grew, of quality so high that we no longer yearned for our youthful days. Mealy potatoes, stringless snap beans and great limas equalling in full those which had long been but a memory.

All these longed-for-by-mankind vegetable foods, with many other varieties we shipped to the city, consigning them to concerns doing business as commission merchants, who had in person or by letter solicited consignments from us and who agreed over the firm's signature to sell our choice and fancy crops at the highest obtainable price and guaranteed to forward immediately proceeds of sales to us, deducting as their commission for transacting the business from 7 to 10 per cent. Astonishment and indignation were extremely close companions from the moment the first returns came in. Consternation was also in