"On the coast of Delaware, a few years ago, there was a place which we shall call X, well suited for oyster-growing, but which sent very few oysters to market, because the railroad rates were so high as to leave no margin of profit. The local oyster-growers represented to the railroad that if the rates were brought down to one dollar per hundred pounds, the business would become profitable and the railroad could be sure of regular shipments at that price. The railroad men looked into the matter. They found that the price of oysters in the Philadelphia market was such that the local oystermen could pay one dollar per hundred pounds to the railroad and still have a fair profit left. If the road tried to charge more, it would so cut down the profit as to leave men no inducement to enter the business. That is, those oysters would bear a rate of one dollar per hundred, and no more. Further, the railroad men found that if they could get every day a carload, or nearly a carload, at this rate, it would more than cover the expense of hauling an extra car by quick train back and forth every day, with the incidental expenses of interest and repairs. So they put the car on, and were disappointed to find that the local oyster-growers could only furnish oysters enough to fill the car about half full. The expense to the road of running it half full was almost as great as of running it full; the income was reduced one-half. They could not make up by raising the rates, for these were as high as the traffic would bear. They could not increase their business much by lowering rates. The difficulty was not with the price charged, but with the capacity of the local business. It seemed as if this special service must be abandoned. "One possibility suggested itself. At some distance beyond X, the terminus of this railroad, was another oyster-growing place, Y, which sent its oysters to market by another route. The supply at Y was very much greater than at X. The people at Y were paying a dollar a hundred to send their oysters to market. It would hardly cost twenty cents to send them from Y to X. If, then, the railroad from X to Philadelphia charged but seventy-five cents a hundred on oysters which came from Y, it could easily fill its car full. This was what they did. They then had half a carload of oysters grown at X, on which they charged a dollar, and half a carload from Y on which they charged seventy-five cents for exactly the same service.