demonstrated two things-first, that it is possible to abolish the mosquito and, second, that the abolition of the mosquito puts an end to yellow fever. The yellow fever mosquito breeds, not in swamps, but in cisterns and pools of fresh water. The beginning of the campaign in New Orleans was the establishment of a sewerage system at the cost of $14,000,000, the city having, prior to 1900, been without sewers. This was followed by stringent ordinances requiring householders to screen all cisterns and other permanent receptacles for water that could not be abolished, because the city was dependent upon them for its entire water supply; and empowering the board of health to drain and oil every other possible breeding place of the mosquito. Heavy penalities were imposed for failure to obey the terms of the ordinance and for a period of several years not a single case of yellow fever, which theretofore had hardly failed to appear annually, has been observed in the city.

The story of the elimination of yellow fever in the Cuban cities, with its tale of heroism on the part of the courageous investigators who demonstrated the the mosquito theory of yellow fever fever at the cost of their own lives, has been often told.

The only really dangerous mosquito in most parts of the country is the one that carries malaria parasites from the blood of infected persons and deposits them in the circulation of healthy individuals. Wherever a case of "chills and fever" is found the malaria mosquito has been there first. Swampy countries are generally known to be malarial districts, but all that is needed to make them as healthful as the uplands is to get rid of the mosquito. The ancient superstitution about the dangers of night air and the mists arising from swamps had a solid foundation in scientific fact. Night air itself is less likely to be polluted with smoke and dust, and mists do not produce disease; but the mosquito that carries the malaria parasite flies at night and the vapors from the swamps are nature's danger signals to mark his hunting grounds.

It is very easy to distinguish the malariacarrying mosquito. When biting or standing at rest the hinder part of its body is elevated at an angle of nearly forty-five degrees from the surface on which it stands.

THE SIGN OF DANGER

THE MALARIA-BEARING MOSQUITO PITCHES ITS BODY AT AN ANGLE OF 45 DEGREES AND HAS PRETERNATURALLY LONG LEGS

All other varieties of mosquito maintain a horizontal position when at rest, but this peculiar attitude of the malaria mosquito, combined with its disproportionately long legs, distinguish it at a glance. And although Mr. Kipling did not specifically refer to the mosquito, it is nevertheless true of it that "the female of the species is more deadly than the male." Although the males outnumber the females by tens to one, the male mosquito never bites and, in fact, seldom eats. His life is a brief and joyless one. The female mosquito, however, although preferring human blood when obtainable, will eat plant juices and the blood of reptiles when warm blooded animals are not accessible. not accessible. Indeed, it is probable that not one mosquito in a million ever gets a taste of human blood. The female mosquito often lives through the winter, hibernating in dark places like attics, clothes-presses, and the crevices between floor and base-board, or outdoors in the cracks in the bark of trees. As soon as the pools of water are warm enough in the spring so her eggs will not freeze she begins to lay, and ten days to three weeks later the young mosquitoes sally forth for their first taste of blood.

Just why the mosquito insists upon leaving its visiting card in the shape of a tiny drop of poison has not been fully explained. The best theory is that the saliva that the insect injects into the wound through which it sucks the blood of its victim serves the purpose of preventing the blood from clotting as it is sucked in. It is through this injection

of saliva that the malaria parasite is transmitted by the mosquito, after having been previously taken into the mosquito's system from the blood of an infected person.

But the most important, if not the most

interesting fact about the mosquito is, again, that its elimination is not only possible but comparatively easy, and that no one need suffer from mosquitoes if individuals and communities will coöperate toward its extinction.

T

HE basis of the new competition is the open price policy. There was a time when the secret price policy prevailed

in the retail trade in this and all other countries, when every merchant large and small sold his wares at as many prices as he had customers, even to the tricky or inadvertent charging of the same customer for the same goods different prices on different days.

That practice has fallen into disrepute in America and England. It has been abandoned by the best dealers on the Continent. But as the traveler approaches the Orient he finds the secret price with all its inherent evils, chief of which is lying, elevated to a fine art. Every purchase is a matter of bargaining, the customer never expects to pay, the dealer never expects to receive, what is asked. Even in Paris there are comparatively few places where one is absolutely sure the price asked is the one and only price; offers bring responses and there is a pretty general conviction that tourists pay more than natives.

Generally speaking the secret price policy is a thing of the past in the retail trade in this country. In the largest and best places of business goods are marked in plain figures and both customers and competitors are free to note and use these figures. Here and there a perfectly reliable merchant clings to the old habit of marking the price in cipher - why? Heaven alone knows, since his cipher is known to every employee, to every competitor who cares to give the matter ten minutes' investigation, and to every bright customer who prices a dozen articles and compares the letters that stand for the figures. The cipher is a relic of the old furtive policy and is bound to go; customers resent it because they are becoming accustomed to plain marks and distrust the man who looks at a few cryptic letters and says the price is so and so if it really is so and so, why not mark it for everybody to read? Why make a confidante of every cash-girl and alienate every customer?

In the manufacturing and contracting world the old, discredited policy prevails.

Manufacturers and contractors, large and small, still do business on a par with the wily Oriental. From the president down to the least important salesman, everybody is clothed with "discretion," everybody can "make" or "shade" a price; if a list is published no one expects to get the prices therein named, there are always discounts, and discounts upon discounts, with a further concession for cash, or an added inducement in terms, and so on endlessly, depending upon the resourcefulness of the salesman, the flexibility of the employer, and their desire to "land the order."

The buyer is never certain when the last word is said; even after the contract is closed he has the feeling that he might have done better if he had held off a little longer it is all a gamble, demoralizing to everyone concerned.

No men should have more respect for their calling or stand higher in the commercial world than the able representatives of great manufacturing and contracting companies, but — judging from what they themselves say of one another few men command so little respect and confidence in even their own circles as "successful" salesmen. This is the fault of the system.

It is the aim of the new competition to change the conditions which produce these results, and the first, the fundamental, the vital step is the adoption of the open price policy.

What is meant by an "open" price?

Exactly what the word signifies, a price that is open and above board, that is known to both competitors and customers, that is marked in plain figures on every article produced, that is accurately printed in every price list issued a price about which there is no secrecy, no evasions, no preferences. In contract work it means that every bid made and every modification thereof shall be known to every competitor for the order; it means that even the cunning and unscrupulous competitor may have this information to use or abuse as he pleases. In short, the open price policy means a complete reversal of methods now in vogue.

Many strongly established manufac

turers who make a practice of adhering quite closely to their prices will say, "Why, that is what we are doing now!" A dozen searching questions will convince them that they are not, and a half dozen crucial propositions to reform their methods along the above lines will lead a goodly number of them to settle back and say, "No, no, that's too advanced for us."

The writer's experience has been that the men who are loudest to insist that they follow the open price policy are the last to adopt it. What they want is a "fixed" price policy.

The secret price is the mark of the old -false competition.

The fixed price is the mark of the illegal combination - suppressed competition. The open price is the mark of the newtrue competition.

Since no two industries follow precisely the same methods in marketing their outputs it is impossible to set forth in detail in a single article the steps that should be followed by all to establish the new policy. Though the fundamental propositions are the same, each industry requires its own reporting scheme. For instance, take the two great divisions in the manufacturing world: (a) those who produce goods that are sold to jobbers and dealers, (b) those who produce only to specifications, each contract differing more or less from all others and calling for a special price or bid.

Obviously, the steps necessary to establish the open price policy among the former (a) will differ from the steps required with the latter (b). Furthermore, it may be said that with any set of manufacturers or contractors the open price movement must be a matter of growth. However willing, no body of men will come to it at a single jump, it is too revolutionary. It takes time to eradicate traces of habits which have become second nature, habits of thought, of speech, of conduct. Even when men are honestly trying to think along the new lines they will talk and correspond along the old, the old phrases will crop out, and their letters will bristle with language that heretofore has been used only in "fixing" prices and suppressing competition.

Take a set of large manufacturers whose work is altogether contract work, where each unit of output is made for special service in a special place and is therefore built to order. It may be a steel bridge, an engine, a turbine, a printing press anything, in short, that is sold on contract.

A prerequisite is the formation of an association. Without coöperation an open price is impossible.

In forming an association it is important to avoid the slightest cause for distrust on the part of the public and customers. The fundamental propositions underlying the organization and every agreement relating in any way to price or competition must be reduced to writing, and the sooner customers and everybody in any way interested are made familiar with the workings of the association the better.

Hold all meetings with open-literally, not figuratively-doors, invite competitors to attend as visitors whether they wish to join or not, and urge any curious or doubting customer to come and observe what is done.

Do nothing you are afraid to record; record everything you do and keep your records where any public official, in the performance of his duties, may have easy access to them. In short, preserve so carefully all evidence regarding intentions, acts, and results, that there will be no room for inference or argument that anything else was intended, done, or achieved.

The writer constantly hears men say, "We have a little association, but we never talk about prices."

"Then why do you meet?"

"Oh, just to lunch and discuss things generally."

Such child-like pretenses deceive no one, not even those who utter them, and no

"Why, I get up and say, 'My price is so and so;' and the others get up and say their prices are 'so and so.'

"And the result is, everybody's price is 'so and so.""

"Naturally, but we don't agree it shall be, we just exchange views and let prices take care of themselves."

This set of men is much franker than the former. They do admit that they come together to help conditions, that they freely discuss prices; and, so long as there is no agreement fixing prices or otherwise. suppressing competition, their action is probably legal even though, as the result of their interchange of views, prices are more or less constant. But the danger lies in the argument that the several statements, "My price is so and so," amount to indirect promises or moral assurances that the price named will not be changed, and that this indirect or moral obligation may be inferred from results.

To go a step further, it probably would not be illegal for men to meet in good faith and compare costs and prices for the purpose of preventing, if possible, disastrous competition and of getting reasonable returns for their products; but to what extent such frank and straightforward efforts to do only what is reasonable and fair from a sound business point of view will be held legal, depends upon the application that the courts may make of the general principles laid down in the Standard Oil and Tobacco cases. However, no man whose aim in life is to bear himself creditably among his fellows cares to split hairs with the law, or to take any chances on a court's decision as to whether his acts are "reasonable" or "unreasonable."

The one safe course is to have nothing to do with any conference or association the objects of which are not clearly expressed in black and white and the proceedings of which are not fully preserved. If the prime object is to help trade con

ditions, then that object should be set forth frankly, and the means adopted should be described so fully that judge and jury can see that they are fair and legal beyond question and quite sufficient to attain the end without resorting to any unexpressed agreement, any moral obligation, or "gentlemen's understanding."

It is believed that the open price policy supplies the means, that it is sound, sensible, and perfectly legal; it involves no action, no agreement of any kind or character that is not well within a man's constitutional rights. The right to publish prices, to exchange bids freely and openly, to deal frankly with customers and competitors, are rights that cannot be curtailed by any legislative body in this country. Congress and legislatures may so provide that the exercise of these rights shall not be abused; that sound and healthful coöperation shall not take on the features of arbitrary and oppressive combination, but coöperation itself cannot be prohibited.

With a central office in charge of a secretary, the members of such an association are ready to establish the open price by filing with the secretary:

1. All inquiries.

2. All bids.

1. The information contained in reports of inquiries is not interchanged. Members are not furnished any information regarding prospective bidders, though there is no legal objection to giving such information, providing it does not lead to collusive bidding; however, the safe course is not to give it. From the reports of inquiries the secretary makes up a weekly bulletin containing statistical information that clearly indicates the amount of business hanging over the market. This report in itself is of value, especially to the small manufacturer who has no means of keeping track of what is going on, and it is of advantage to the large producer since it helps the small to bid more intelligently, and intelligent competition is never so demoralizing as ignorant competition.

2. Information contained in bids is

interchanged. No member is allowed to say what he expects to bid or even that he does or does not intend to bid; but as each member makes a bid he sends by same mail a copy of his proposal to the secretary. As bids are received they are immediately interchanged among the bidders; the filing of a bid on a particular job is the key that opens to the bidder all other bids on the same job.

Now comes another fundamental proposition. No bidder is bound to adhere to his bid for the fraction of a second. After ascertaining the bids of others each is free to lower his own bid to secure the work, but in all fairness he must immediately file all changes so as to give other bidders. chances to come in and compete further.

"That is a rotten scheme!" exclaims the man who has come to the meeting with the sole purpose of "boosting" prices.

"Talk about competition! That will fling the doors wide open," protests another, and so on.

The writer has heard many such remarks, and it may be said here that most old-time manufacturers are slow to try the new policy; it appeals more strongly to younger men who are not saturated with price-fixing notions.

As a matter of fact the free and frank interchange of bids with perfect liberty to cut and slash as members please does not result in fiercer competition. On the contrary, while it does not lessen true competition, it takes out the bitterness, the ugly elements that go to make up the old "cut-throat" competition. Since members are free to bid as they please, it removes the one prolific source of complaint and recrimination incidental to old-time associations, namely: that "some one is cutting under" and thereby violating an agreement, expressed or implied, to observe some price.

It is impossible to keep men to a fixed price, therefore why waste time trying to? It is possible to keep them to an agreement to tell others what they have done.

Note the distinction: the fixed price means an agreement of some kind to maintain a price, to do something, to live up to something. That sort of an agreement is never kept for long. No penalty