It's lucky that you inherit from your father so many important things that most men have to spend their lives in learning." "Do you think so ?" said he, brightening; for, with the "chance" secure, he was now much depressed by the difficulties which he had been resurveying from the inside point of view.
"You understand how to manage men," she replied, "and you understand business." "But, unfortunately, this isn't business." He was right.

The problem of business is, in its two main factors, perfectly simple--to make a wanted article, and to put it where those who want it can buy.

But this was not Arthur Ranger's problem, nor is it the problem of most business men in our time.

Between maker and customer, nowadays, lie the brigands who control the railways--that is, the highways; and they with equal facility use or defy the law, according to their needs.

When Arthur went a-buying grain or stave timber, he and those with whom he was trading had to placate the brigands before they could trade; when he went a-selling flour, he had to fight his way to the markets through the brigands.