"I know we had, and several places besides, where liquor was sold. But, everybody far and near knew Simon Slade the miller, and everybody liked him. He was a good miller, and a cheerful, social, chatty sort of man putting everybody in a good humor who came near him. So it became the talk everywhere, when he built this house, which he fitted up nicer than anything that had been seen in these parts. Judge Hammond, Judge Lyman, Lawyer Wilson, and all the big bugs of the place at once patronized the new tavern, and of course, everybody else did the same. So, you can easily see how he got such a run." "It was thought, in the beginning," said I, "that the new tavern was going to do wonders for Cedarville." "Yes," answered the man laughing, "and so it has." "In what respect?" "Oh, in many. It has made some men richer, and some poorer." "Who has it made poorer?" "Dozens of people. You may always take it for granted, when you see a tavern-keeper who has a good run at his bar, getting rich, that a great many people are getting poor." "How so?" I wished to hear in what way the man who was himself, as was plain to see, a good customer at somebody's bar, reasoned on the subject. "He does not add to the general wealth. He produces nothing. He takes money from his customers, but gives them no article of value in return--nothing that can be called property, personal or real. He is just so much richer and they just so much poorer for the exchange. Is it not so?" I readily assented to the position as true, and then said-- "Who, in particular, is poorer?" "Judge Hammond, for one." "Indeed! I thought the advance in his property, in consequence of the building of this tavern, was so great, that he was reaping a rich pecuniary harvest." "There was a slight advance in property along the street after the 'Sickle and Sheaf' was opened, and Judge Hammond was benefited thereby. Interested parties made a good deal of noise about it; but it didn't amount to much, I believe." "What has caused the judge to grow poorer?" "The opening of this tavern, as I just said." "In what way did it affect him?"