Isidor Straus, then the head of the business, sat in the office of his friend and counsel, Edmond E. Wise, in a downtown office. Mr. Wise put the thing frankly and without equivocation before his client. He said that it would be a hard legal fight, no doubt of that, but that a great principle was at stake; the keen mind of the lawyer was convinced of the economic fallacy of the position of the publishers' association. Quietly Mr. Straus told his attorney to go ahead. He said that he would fight the fight, to the last ditch. No expense was to be spared. The case would be carried, if necessary, in every instance to the highest court of appeal. Accordingly, Mr. Wise prepared a suit against the American Publishers' Association which holds the record for appeal in the history of jurisprudence in this country. Three times it went up to the Court of Appeals of the State of New York; finally, after nine years of legal battle, it was carried to the United States Supreme Court, which, after due deliberation, decided every point in favor of R. H. Macy & Company. That was in December, 1913. Early in the following May the firm had the satisfaction of having the publishers hand over a check on the Park National Bank for $140,000. This sum represented a settlement for the difficulties that Macy's had had to undergo for more than a dozen years past in getting stock for its book department. Ofttimes it was necessary to follow devious paths indeed to gain this end--and still hold fast to the fundamental underselling policy of the store. Sometimes the store had to go so far as to send to other retail stores to buy a certain volume, at the full retail price, and then resell it to its patrons, at its customary ten per cent. off the price of the store at which it had just purchased it. So much if you please for the expense of standing by a principle!