AUXILIARY DISTRIBUTION. 381 



his original form, dependent on scattered producers for 

 keeping up his various stocks, was sure to be often deficient 

 of one or other thing asked for. In places where population 

 had become great enough, he naturally then had recourse 

 to a larger retailer who was pretty certain to have a supply 

 (as retailers even now buy of one another to satisfy cus 

 tomers) ; and in proportion as the larger retailer thus had 

 his stocks continually drawn upon, he gradually became 

 one who laid in stocks for the supply of other retailers; 

 until, finding he made good profits on these transactions, he 

 devoted himself wholly to the supplying of retailers: he 

 became a wholesale trader. As fast as he assumed this char 

 acter he benefited by taking journeys to buy economically 

 the larger stocks he needed he grew into a travelling mer 

 chant, or else a merchant who got his orders executed at a 

 distance, either in his own country or abroad. At the pres 

 ent day the genesis of such is observable. To a cheese 

 monger who has a large business, it occurs that instead of 

 waiting for farmers to bring their cheeses to market, he may 

 gain by going round among them, inspecting their cheese- 

 rooms, and offering them prices somewhat below those they 

 might otherwise get prices which they accept because, 

 while saving the cost of carriage to market, they avoid the 

 risk of a glut which might force them to take still lower 

 prices. Hence results the cheese-factor, to whom retail 

 sellers of cheese go for their supplies. Similarly with corn, 

 men like the brothers Sturge in the last generation, ride 

 about to the local markets, ten, twenty, thirty miles off, and 

 buy from the farmers at somewhat reduced prices, in con 

 sideration of the large quantities taken and the certainty of 

 payment. Then from their large granaries millers and 

 others fulfil their needs. 



Traders of the converse kind have similarly developed. 

 Out of wandering pedlars with their small quantities, there 

 grew up those who conveyed large quantities to the great 

 centres of trade. Even in the doings of the uncivilized, 



