long tour is very heavy, and will usually contribute a certain sum for advertising. In the end he gets the same returns as under the other plan. Few pianists under this plan receive less than fifty dollars a concert, and it has been plausibly stated that one very popular pianist is to receive a gratuity of forty thousand dollars for playing a certain instrument in a tour of a hundred or more concerts.

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This will go toward explaining the tery which surrounds the existence of so many concert pianists, who play week after week to handfuls of people or to audiences which are obviously of the deadhead variety. It is a sad and solemn fact that of all the pianists who have played over this country since Rubinstein was here, the number that have actually made money, over and above what they cost their managers or backers, is probably less than a score. Indeed, it would be very difficult to name even ten whose tours showed at the end a balance on the right side of the ledger. Of these, a few, a very few, have made large sums. The rest have made what, if music were really conducted on a business basis, would be a modest livelihood.

The activity of piano manufacturers does not end with pianists, although naturally the greatest part of their energy and money is spent on them. They often subsidize tours of orchestras, of violinists, of 'cellists, of conducting-composers and composing-conductors, and few singers of prominence start on a concert tour without the comfortable knowledge that a snug sum is to come from the makers of the piano which is to be used in the concerts. Violinists especially are notoriously a "poor business proposition." Very few of them, however picturesque in appearance, make money for those who back their tours, and an explanation of their personal prosperity is very often found in the "underline" on the programme of the concerts where they appear, to the effect that "The Piano is a Such-and-such," even when no piano appears on the stage. And so it is with other instrumentalists.

What money is made in music in America is made by singers, although the amounts earned by them are usually grossly exaggerated. Still, the singer appeals to a much wider public than the instrumentalist, whether it be an operatic star or a humble worker in the ranks of those who daily make havoc with oratorios and songs. And speaking of oratorios brings us at once to the subject of choral societies and "music festivals." They may be disposed of in a few words. Few music festivals, backed as they usually are by the full influence of civic pride, manage to make more than their expenses; and if choral societies do not enjoy a guarantee or subsidy, it may be inferred with reasonable safety that during the Christmas holidays they give one or more performances of the Messiah. Handel's masterwork constitutes the chief source of income of an overwhelming majority of choral societies. The announcement of its performance is sufficient to fill the house not because of its intrinsic musical worth, however great that may be, but because it has become by tradition, as no other oratorio, a vehicle of worship peculiarly appropriate at Christmas, thus attracting thousands all over the country who are never seen in a concert hall on any other occasion. The money made by the Messiah concerts goes far toward paying the deficits incurred by those which present some more modern work.

It is an interesting fact that of all branches of music, it is only among singers that the supply is unequal to the demand, that is to say, of course, the supply of good singers. This naturally accounts for its being for managers, general and local, the most profitable branch of the business, and it is the branch which is conducted most nearly in a really business-like manner. Concerts by singers are bought and sold with the idea that they will make money for all concerned, the singers, the impressario, and the local manager. The singer's fee, in the case of a "star," is regulated generally by what

he or she "can bring into the house." No prima donna (we limit ourselves to them, as men singers of very high price are rarely available for concert work) gets in a series of concerts an average fee of $1000, $1500, or $2000, unless it has been fairly well proved by experience that she will bring in that much and more at the boxoffice, which is a final test of a singer's success. Very few get such sums, but such as do may be fairly reckoned as earning them.

With the next grade of singers, those who give song recitals, sing in oratorios at the larger festivals and the like, for fees ranging from $150 to $500, their price is largely the result of supply and demand. Few of them, of themselves, could bring to the box-office the amount of money that is paid for their services, but they are necessary, there are not very many of them, and their names combined with others make the prospectus of a concert attractive. As for the great army of obscurities, the "serviceable," the "reliable," and the "conscientious" singers who will accept any fee, they sing chiefly for the sake of advertisement, thus to increase the number of their pupils. Wonderfully enough, they very often succeed in their end.

Yet despite the fact that this branch of the musical business is generally profitable, how many impressarios have died rich? Maurice Grau retired from the Metropolitan Opera House after five years of exceptional prosperity, the possessor of a comfortable fortune. He is the first man in the history of music in this country to do so. Abbey, Strakosch, Maretzek, Mapleson, de Vivo, to say no

thing of the scores of "little fellows," left nothing to show for their years of labor. They made singers rich, but the inevitable deficit got them at last.

If one has a commodity, or even a luxury, to sell, and after it has been placed on the market at a large expenditure nothing but loss results, either the public does not want the article and it is a failure or there is something radically wrong with the business methods which have exploited it. Music would be in that case were it not for a factor which is peculiar to itself. It is a luxury for which the public will not pay the amount necessary to produce and market it. Yet one cannot say that the public does not want it, since it spends several million dollars each year for it. Nor can it be said that there is something radically wrong in the manner in which it is sold to the public. All things considered, the business is fairly well administered. While in isolated cases commercial methods are used in its exploitation which are decidedly open to criticism, the musical activity of this country may be generally attributed to an altruistic purpose on the part of a minority to teach the great majority to find pleasure and comfort in the divine art. And until this majority has learned its lesson and has begun to contribute its part to the support of music, this great deficit will continue, increasing as a wider public is reached for, because the only way in which this great majority can ever be reached is by keeping the supply larger than the actual demand, thus leaving empty seats in the concert halls for new converts.

THE present French Minister of Finance, M. Caillaux, in a recent letter discussing the proposed income tax, declared that negotiable securities—in the form of stocks and bonds now represent the larger part of public wealth. This probably exaggerates somewhat the proportion in which such securities enter into the aggregate of the national resources, even in such investing countries as France and England; but the spirit of his statement is correct, that the importance of this element of wealth has increased enormously within the past two or three decades. So great has been this growth, and so easily capable of concealment and quick transfer are the evidences of ownership of property in this form, that the French government permitted a semi-official suggestion to leak out in the summer of 1906, that an international conference should be proposed to devise means to prevent the citizens or subjects of any one country from escaping taxation by keeping their securities abroad. The project was so chimerical, and so little likely to receive the sympathy of the governments of those countries which have profited by the transfer of French capital to their markets, that it was at first regarded as nothing more than an attempt to frighten a few timid owners of securities into declaring their foreign holdings for purposes of taxation. At the session of the Chambers last summer, however, a project was included in the budget report, for requiring foreign banks with branches in France and French banks with branches abroad to furnish to the government lists of their depositors with the amounts of their deposits, whether in money or securities. The project failed for the time VOL. 101- NO. 1

being, but the seriousness with which it was pressed indicates the important part which securities now play in the wealth of civilized countries.

Exactly what proportion of the total wealth of the world is made up of negotiable securities, there are not sufficient data to determine with precision. Estimates have been made, however, from available sources of information, of the face value of such securities quoted on European exchanges and, in some cases, of their market value. In the United States a preliminary examination of the field by the present writer has shown visible outstanding securities issued by American corporations to the amount of $34,514,351,382. An inquiry conducted by the Bureau of the Census into the value of the physical property of the country showed a total in 1904 of $107,104,192,410. Upon the face of these figures, nearly one-third of the wealth of the United States is represented by securities.

There are several modifying factors to be taken into account, however, before accepting this estimate as definitive. The most important of these is the fact that a considerable proportion of these securities are owned by holding companies or by other corporations. If the securities issued directly by such companies are considered as based upon their investments in other securities, there is a duplication of the same capital, which should be eliminated in order to reach the net wealth of the country represented by negotiable securities. The amount of such inter-corporate holdings of securities, so far as has been ascertained, is $10,120,418,699. If this amount is deducted from the par value of the total volume of securities ascertained, the net

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wealth represented in this form is $24,393,932,683. It is probable that these estimates are considerably within the truth, since the methods which were employed in making the preliminary survey did not permit the searching out of all small local corporations, nor did it permit the ascertainment in all cases of corporate holdings of securities.

The factor of market value of securities is important, but the market value of the stocks and bonds dealt with did not vary radically in the aggregate, in spite of individual variations, from their

par

value, the par value standing at $34,514,351,382, and the market value of the same securities on June 30, 1905, at $35,460,506,877. In discussion of the aggregate, we can then, for most purposes, deal with par values without straying far from the truth.

The par value of stocks issued by American corporations and ascertained to be outstanding on June 30, 1905, was $21,023,392,955, and of bonds $13,490,958,427. How these were divided among different classes of corporations appears in the table below:

Here then we have a total volume of securities, without going to Latin America and Australia, that more than equals the entire wealth of the United States. Is it any wonder that the security markets have come to represent, more than ever before, the pulse of economic life, and that he who contemplates doing anything to disturb those markets, even to further the ends of justice, should weigh carefully the consequences of his acts?

As has been said, there are no data which are absolutely accurate in regard to the ratio of securities in each country to the aggregate wealth of the country. Several intelligent estimates have been made, however, by careful statisticians in Europe as well as in the United States. One of these, made by Mr. Michael G. Mulhall for 1896, printed in the volume of the United States Census on "Wealth, Debt and Taxation," puts the total wealth of Europe, in all forms of property, at $342,528,602,500, or $755 per capita. The richest country is naturally the United Kingdom, with a valuation of $57,453,899,000, which affords an average per capita of $1,455. France is credited with wealth to the amount of $47,156,385,000, which amounts to $1,228 per capita, while Germany shows a valuation of $39,185,058,000, or $751

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per capita. Only four other countries rise to a level as high as Germany in per capita wealth, Denmark, with a computed wealth of $2,462,449,000, or $1,119 per capita; the Netherlands, with $4,282,520,000, or $892 per capita; Switzerland, with $2,394,318,000, or $798 per capita; and Belgium, with $4,808,102,000, or $751 per capita. The Empire of Russia shows a large total, $31,267,262,500; but when it is distributed over her great population of 105,800,000, it yields an average per capita of only $296.

If all the securities quoted on the Paris Bourse were counted as a part of the wealth of France, it would justify the declaration of M. Caillaux, that the larger portion of the wealth of the country was represented by the value of securities. It is only by weeding out duplications, however, of securities issued in foreign countries and quoted on several exchanges, that the correct relation is obtained between total wealth and wealth represented by securities. With these modifications, it appears that about