for after they buy them from us, but I would be glad and grateful if they would try the experiment on this new book whether the underselling which has crept in of late years, does good really to anybody." It is most gratifying that the present head of that firm should have done so much to bring to an end the unjust system of discounts. It was stated that nearly 80,000 copies of the Globe Shakespeare were sold within six months of its publication. In 1867, after many years of unrest, matters were again brought under discussion through Mr. Thomas Bosworth, of Regent Street, giving excessive discounts. I have before me a leaflet issued by this bookseller entitled "Rattening in the Book Trade." In this leaflet he complains of Messrs. Hamilton, Adams & Co. having closed his account, owing to his continuing to sell to the public books at trade prices and sometimes less than that. This did not continue very long, as I find that in 1869 he had to make a composition with his creditors. In 1890 the parent of the Associated Booksellers of Great Britain and Ireland was formed, under the title of "The London Booksellers' Society," and I am proud to record that I was one of the early members of its Council. The main object of the Society was to restrict discounts to 25 per cent., and it issued a price list from 6_d._ to £2 2_s._ showing these discounts. Had it not been for the introduction of the net system, this Booksellers' Association would in all probability have followed the footsteps of its predecessors. A correspondent in "The Bookseller" for 1877 gives a very despondent account of the bookseller and the way the bookselling trade was carried on. This despondency was caused mainly by the iniquitous system of discounts which were then being given to the public and the unfair methods of business, owing to the want of harmony and business regulations. The correspondent says that "A bookseller of to-day is very often a man who might just as well be a cheese-monger or a pork-butcher for anything he knows or cares about books; and as for him being capable of guiding or advising his customers, they have sometimes no little trouble in making him understand a requirement that lies just outside the current of popular demands. The cause of this degeneracy is not far to seek: it is the undignified and unneighbourly scramble for custom, in which each man's object is to give away a larger discount in the shilling than anyone else. Unless booksellers can be found who will have the courage to stand out of this scramble and be content to serve such customers who are willing to pay a fair price for their books, it is to be feared that the race of booksellers will become extinct." Fortunately, by the introduction of the net system, this downward tendency has been stopped, and the bookselling trade is gradually taking the place it deserves in the world of letters.