From Town Drudgery 249 



food in the shape of books and newspapers will 

 then be so cheap as to be scarcely worth con- 

 sidering. It is probable that in those days 

 people will not herd together at the sacrifice of 

 sunshine and quiet. 



The workman of to-day earns by his day's 

 labor twice as much food and four times as 

 much manufactured goods clothes, tools, fur- 

 niture as his father did in the same time. 

 When we come to books and newspapers the 

 contrast is more astonishing. The average 

 mechanic can now buy for one day's work 

 more books than a month's work would have 

 brought him a century ago, or a year's work 

 would have brought him in the Middle Ages. 

 More than that, thanks to cheap postage and 

 circulating libraries, books are to be had almost 

 for the asking. One of the things that the 

 Government could do for the intellectual 

 growth of the country would be to make the 

 postage upon books almost nominal. This is 

 done in the case of newspapers, which are sent 

 through the mails to subscribers for one cent a 

 pound ; but in the case of books, postage is 

 still exorbitant. 



