tion of an engraving in which lines and textures have been already laid down.

The third prize ($50) is awarded to

C. H. Latham, pupil of W. B. Closson, Boston. Age, twenty-two. Time of practice, fourteen months. Time of instruction, nine months. Characteristics of work: Admirable skill in rendering the color and qualities of a difficult print. Original, reduced photograph from line engraving on steel.

Honorable mention is also due to

Mary L. Owens, New York, pupil of Miss C. A. Powell, neat line and good color; ten months' practice.

Vincent E. Brockway, New York City, pupil of A.

Hayman, delicacy of line and texture; fifteen months' practice.

M. L. Brown, Brookline, Mass., pupil of Henry C. Cross, of Boston, Mass., general effect and careful work; eleven months' practice.

Horace E. Babcock, Morrisania, N. Y., pupil under general instruction from T. Cole, marked ability in handling varied and difficult subjects; six months' practice.

Louise Caldwell, New York, pupil of J. P. Davis, skill in fac-simile work; ten months' practice. P. Aitken, Gravesend, N. Y., pupil of T. Cole, care

ful work and rapid improvement, and feeling for subject; between six and seven months' practice. Alfred L. Bishop, Mount Vernon, N. Y., pupil of W. J. Wilson, eight months' practice. Lewis S. Rea, Philadelphia, pupil of J. Rea; eighteen months' practice.

Lettie R. Willoughby, Philadelphia, pupil of Miss Alice Barber.

The following competitors are also deemed worthy of encouragement:

H. E. Everett, Boston, pupil of W. J. Dana.
Hiram P. Barnes, Waltham, Mass., self-taught.
F. S. Blanchard, Albion, Mich.

Nettie C. Pollock, Baltimore, a few weeks' practice.

By reference to page 954, it will be seen that the offer is renewed for the year 1881, with an additional prize to the competitors of 1880.

It would be rash to attempt either to limit or to predict the future of woodengraving in this country; but its most prominent growth and its mellowest fruit are likely to be found along the new graft it has received from the art of painting. Doubtless, as long as there is a popular enjoyment of good paintings there will be a corresponding demand for their representation by wood-cuts; for, in the nature of things, however valuable a mechanical "process" may be in retaining the quality of artistic fac-simile, it can never supply the delicacy and original force of the graver. Just now a certain showiness and false activity attach to the propagandism of art in America,-due, perhaps, partly to the influence of fashionable bad models, and partly to the emphasis which the recording agencies of the time put upon any public movement; still, the large number of good canvases to be found here is creating, and will continue to create, a milieu in which the national genius will find the best conditions of growth. In the

more restricted range of the engraver's art there is much less danger of being misled by bad examples, since impressions of the best blocks of foreign and American origin are easily had; but that there is much yet to be learned is evident to any one who is familiar with the subject. Many engravers can cut their lines clearly, and, up to a certain point, intelligently, whose work stops just this side of expressing feeling; while with others, under the stimulating thought of the time, theoretical knowledge has outrun manual skill. We need more simplicity and directness of method, more sturdiness of the Bewick type, more of the breadth and poetry of Millet, with less sentimentalism, and less of mere niggling and prettiness. An engraving must "hang together" as much as a painting, cohering with the force of a single conception, and not joined by a synthesis of atomic bits, however delicately wrought. This nothing can induce like a study of the best art; but even that can do little where the character of the engraver is not genuine and liberal, and constantly open to truthful and vital influences. Nowhere else does the axiom hold stronger that whatever the man is,-whether petty, or narrow, or frank, or honest, his work takes the same color, and

SHOPS there will be, and shopmen and shoppers, till the end of time. The relations of these last two have never been wholly happy, and changes have been attempted from time to time, and a still greater and more radical change seems to be in the near future. Neither the purchaser nor the dealer is quite satisfied with the present status, and it may be worth the while to examine, from the shopper's point of view, a commercial revolution that seems to be impending.

Many years ago, a few ill-paid clerks in the London General Post-office said among themselves that the ways of the average tea-man were grievous; so every man put his shilling into a fund, and they bought a chest of tea of the wholesale dealer. They met "after hours," and, with honest scales, VOL. XXI.-70.

weighed out the tea. They knew just what they got, and they got it without misrepresentation, adulteration, or teasing solicitation to buy, and, withal, in happy escape from bills and all the woes that from them flow. They hid the tea-chest under the post-office stairs, and sold the tea to each other at just what it cost. So cheering were the cups brewed from that tea that the clerks decided to purchase more; but the authorities tumbled the tea-chest into the street, and forbade such dealings within the sacred walls of Her Majesty's post; so the clerks had no resource but to set up a little store for themselves, which soon became known as the "Post-office Store." This was one beginning of the shoppers' rebellion.

Far away from London, in the once lovely dale of the Roch, there were certain

flannel weavers, who also felt aggrieved with the shopmen. They, too, combined, and put in, with almost heart-breaking stintings and denials, their hard-won pennies, and, amid jeers and insults from their fellows, opened a pitiful little shop in Toad lane, Rochdale. They bought and sold to themselves flour, tea, and sugar, and with the money saved staved off the pawn-shop and the work-house. This was the second beginning of the shoppers' rebellion. In point of time it was the first; but this is immaterial now. The fact remains that the Civil Service stores of London and the Equitable Pioneers, and their vast following, have at last joined hands, and the retail business world, both of this country and Great Britain, have to face and solve a great social and commercial question. The shopmen and the coöperators may be trusted to settle their differences between themselves; but the shoppers, the buyers, the great public that supports the stores of every kind, naturally asks in what way it is to be benefited. Shall it welcome the Civil Service store, the coöperator's flour-mill and bakery, or take the shopman's advice, and crush the whole scheme before it does any further harm-to the shopman?

Once upon a time a certain noble English lord wished to buy an envelope, and he entered a stationer's shop and laid down a penny for one. The shop-girl gave him the envelope and kept the penny, whereupon his lordship upbraided her and demanded the half-penny change. The time was, but is not now, when the average American would have looked upon such an incident with amused contempt. He has of late grown wiser, and sees that his lordship was right. Extortion is extortion, be it in ha'-pence or dollars. Now, when the American goes to London, he besieges the doors of the Civil Service Store in persistent and frantic chase after its wonderful bargains. He, too, has a soul not above ha'-pence.

Number 117 Victoria street, Westminster, S. W., looks very much like a club-house. It is, however, a shop-in fact, a huge aggregation of shops, under one palatial roof and one management-that of the Army and Navy Coöperative Society, Victoria street. This is the Bon Marché, the idealized "Macy's," of London, concerning which the American girl writes home, and which she tries by all her arts to enter. Sometimes she succeeds, and obtains the coveted right to trade at the great warehouse. Though young in years, she is a venerable

shopper: she has shopped at Wanamaker's, at Stewart's, at Jordan & Marsh's, and at the Bon Marché, and she is under the impression that she cannot be taught much in that direction. The burly lackey who opens the stately doors receives her with dignity, and the wonderful vision opens wide on every side. She had great expectations, but they are here surpassed. Around, on every side, below, above, are shops in bewildering variety. Everywhere she sees an elegantly dressed crowd, intent on bargains. There is a table and writing materials, and thick books of reference. These are the price lists, and she consults the maps of the floors to see where the various departments are located. No lofty-minded floor-walker annoys her with impertinent advice. The rasping voice of the cash-girl is nowhere heard. Nobody asks her to buy. There is one price for all, cash down, and as for bargains-their like is not known in Regent street or Broadway.

This Army and Navy Coöperative Society is now only one of a number of great aggregations of stores in London, and these are only half of one per cent. of the great multitude of coöperative stores in Great Britain. The society consists of several thousand persons, all more or less connected with Her Majesty's army and navy, and each of these officers, or officers' widows or children, owns one or more onepound shares in its enormous capital. The aim of this society is simply and wholly to sell to its own members good and fine groceries, teas, furniture, dry goods, and what not, at the lowest possible cost. From the money taken at the counter, rent, wages, working expenses, and interest on capital are paid. If there is a little profit besides, this, too, is divided, but the aim is at all times to sell cheap. If the profits increase the prices are lowered, and thus the seller is literally "barred from gain." Everything is arranged to give the member the bargain. This society is founded upon what is known as the "Civil Service Plan," and its aim is to save the purchaser and member the profits ordinarily taken by the retail dealer. The other coöperative societies, working under what is called the "Rochdale Plan," sell to their members at the regular market rates, and at the end of each quarter return to the purchaser a dividend in cash on the business he brings to the store. It is estimated that one-twentieth of the entire population of England now purchase their daily bread and get their

shoes, hats, and clothing at the coöperative bakery, flour-mill, and retail store. Half a million of people have already joined the shoppers' rebellion, and month by month sees their numbers increase by thousands. To give an idea of the magnitude of these associations, it may be briefly noticed that their balance-sheets can be easily obtained, and all may read of their actual work and financial position. From late reports, it appears the Army and Navy Society sold goods during the half year ending September, 1880, to the value of £939,266 17s., while its total income from was £940,403 IS. 11d., this being an increase of £47,938 over the business of the same period of the year before. The net profits, after paying working expenses, interest on deposits, etc., amounted to 16,766 13s. 5d., this being a net profit on sales of less than fourpence in the pound. The number of share-holders is given in the report at 13,585, life members 4961, annual subscribers 17,971. The assets of the society in cash, building, stock, etc., were placed at £430,959 11s. 3d.

all sources

The Civil Service Coöperative Society, in its fourteenth annual statement, gives its sales at £514,143 14s. 10d. Its membership is put down at about 12,000.

The Civil Service Supply Association, in its half-yearly report of June 30, 1879, gives the number of members holding shares at 4374. It issued tickets to subscribers to the number of 28,834. Its sales for the six months reached £706,256 9s. 92d., the net profit for the half-year being £8198 17s. 71⁄2d. Its assets are put down at £367,575 4s. 4d. A new society, designed to supply ladies' dress goods and wearing apparel of all kinds, called the Ladies' Dress Association, has made very rapid progress within the past two years, and from its report for August, 1879, claims a membership of 4411. Its sales in fourteen months reached £93,953 12s. 3d., this being an increase of over eighty-three per cent. over the same time a year before. Since that report its business has greatly increased. A society on the same plan is in contemplation in New York, and will, no doubt, soon be ready for busi

shopman chiefly, and the American retailer in a lesser degree, are alone to blame.

In the first place, there are too many shopmen. This has resulted in a great number of small stocks in many little stores, with the consequent increased rent, insurance, labor, advertising, waste, and inconvenience, all of which the dealer must offset by charging higher prices. Secondly, these stores have given credit, which implies book-keeping, the expense of collections, and the loss of bad debts, for all of which the consumer must pay in higher prices. Thirdly, there has been misrepresentation and adulteration, which quite naturally has alienated what little regard the buyer may have had for the dealer. Lastly, the British shopman, if not his cousin, has been unpleasantly insistent on a purchase, and has had two prices.

The coöperator seeks to remedy all this by massing many stores under one roof, by reducing the labor of distribution, and by insisting on cash payment. Happily, the American dealer has scented the coming conflict from afar, and is trying to forestall the complaints of the shopper. There is an evident disposition to merge many small stores into one, and thus reduce rent, labor, insurance, and to save time and trouble generally. In such bazaars, lower prices are quite possible, as the shopping public has already learned. The one-price system is peculiarly American, and needs no comment. Cash is getting to be the general rule in large cities, and it should be insisted upon everywhere. Why should the buyer, with money in hand, be forced to pay more to compensate the foolish dealer for the faults of a purchaser who can not or will not pay his debts?

It seems to be recognized that the coöperative store, on either the Rochdale plan (which seems to be the best) or the Civil Service system, is destined to get and keep a firm foot-hold in this country. Once started, it will grow with ten times the speed of its sturdy British predecessor. Only the dishonesty, ignorance, and want of method of those who have hitherto attempted such experiments have stood in the way.

Now it is understood, and, in new hands, it is plain that it will command the respectful attention of the shopping world. Whether the coöperative stores grow fast or slow, one thing is certain: the retail trade will be greatly modified and greatly improved, both by the force of necessity and example. Whatever happens, the shoppers will gain, and their vigorous rebellion will be of the greatest benefit to all concerned.