LA _ | making New Year resolutions comes {farming could not continue in West- __THE DAILY BRITISH WHIG THE YEAR JUST AHEAD. Dwelling in the past is not to be recommended. But the best prepara- tion for meeting problems yet to arise is knowledge of what has heen done fn the years behind us. This is stock-taking time in the business world. "How do I stand?" is the EE enough to know how "I" stand. How | do business and humanity generally { stand? How did they fare in the 12 months just closed? How do ree} sults accomplished compare with those of preceding years? With pre- | cise information before us we may | gauge future prospects and plan in-| telligently for the new year. The greatest asset of mankind is the general fund of knowledge ac-| cumulated through the ages. The | ancient and respectable pastime of | down to the simple matter of making decisions in the light of experience. | Not of one's own experience but of collective experience. Knowledge of What was done in-1923, added to the | store of information previously as- sembled, constitutes § strengthening of the guards Stel ats provided use be made of it. THE WESTERN FARMERS' COMPLAINT. +The executive of the Saskatche- want Grain Association were evi- dently in a pessimistic mood at a meeting held a few days ago, at which' the opinion was expressed that ern Canada under the present con- ditions. This plea has been heard good is your past if you use it for the future? rumor that" Germany is col- is five years old now. only thing in Canada ad and placid as a cathedral is | xico stands not alone in having 80 often, and has been followed or §0 many occasions by a boom per- fod in agriculture that, like the fable cry of "wolf" it has somewhat lost its effect. The reason given for this opinion is one which has been heard on many occasions during the past three or four years. The west- ern farmers complain that the dis- parity between the price they have to pay for the necessities of produc- tion and of life and the price which | they receive for their products 1s | 80 great that they will be forced out of business. This cry was first rals- ed three years ago, when the bottom fell out of the wheat market ama brought prices down to a low level. | Yet farming has continued, and this year the west produced the greatest on. Several Protestant church- a the same fix. married man knows haw a feels as nominal head of that he seems to be able @ a hint and act on it. folk are those who that you kmow they i from a book of etiquette. kisses his wife passionately, in months won't have a much of it for two are fanny. A man may be Ave and remain a. gentleman, l he eats with his ¢ 1,8 Year. The manufacturers are hard pressed, probably as hard Bits Is & hard world, and by tn you win a reputation for liber. 49 keep its nose on the while keeping its ear on crop in its history. If there is any doubt in the minds of the western farmers of thelr ability to continue in agriculture, the fault does not altogether lie In the conditions they have specified. They should not constantly look to the other Industries to help them out of difficulties which are, to a cer tain extent, of their own making. They ¢an hope for little in that di- rection, because the manufacturing industries have also had their troubles. They find their margins of profits smaller than they were four or five years ago, because they have been facing a lessened demand for their goods, and have had to carry on the smaller business with the same overhead charges as before. This not only lessens their, profits, but keeps up the price of their goods. A The manufacturer whose plant is working at only half its ca- pacity cannot sell goods as cheaply as If it were operating at full ca- pacity, and cannot earn the same profits, just as the farmer cannot expect to get as much profit out of a cow giving 4,000 pounds of milk in a year as he can out of a cow which gives 10,000 pounds of milk in pressed as the farmers, so that there cant be no hope for any matétial re- duction in the cost of necessities of production and of life. "It has been stated time without | number that the various depart- ments of agriculture, federal and provincial, have been doing all in their power to help the agricultural industry. The trouble is that most of their efforts have been misdirect- od. They have been trying to teach the farmers of Canada how to farm, instead of teaching them how to farm profitably, and there is a vast difference between these two points. farmers is not the difference be- tween the price of what he sells and the price of the articles he has to Buy. The real trouble is the ditfer- ence in the price the ultimate The trouble which faces the western | solving it that the efforts of the de- partments of agriculture should bé devoted. THORNTON'S OPTIMISM. Speaking at Toronto a few' days ago, Sir Henry Thornton, head of the Canadian National Railways, made the most optimistic statement which how yet-bren mederegurding the tu: ture prospects of the system. His statement was a complete and very effective reply to the many criticisms which have eminated from certain | quarters In respect to the future of the national railways, and to the mournful wails which have been ut- tered in respect to the future of Can- ada. In these criticisms, it appeared that the whole prosperity of Canada was dependent upon the possibility of making the national railways pay their way. If that view be a correct one, then Canada is well on the way to a condition of greater prosperity than ever before. In his statement, Sir Henry pre-. dicted that for the present year the Canadian National Railways--would roll up a net operating Surplus of $18,000,000. In vie® of the fact that up to two years dgo the rallway was yearly reporting operating de- ficits, this is a decided improvement which gives cause for much hope tor the future. But that was not the only encouraging statement made, Sir Henry went on to say that, in his opinion, formed after nearly eighteen months of experience at the head of the system, within three years the railways would be earning a prpfit, after paying all the huge , capital charges. It is a matter tor wonder that this could ever be possible, for the burden of capital - charges had been hanging like a millstone around the neck of the national railways ever since the system came into pos- session of the government. Capital charges have been responsible for much of the huge deficits which have been rolled up year after year. The capital charges will more than ab- sorb the surplus of $18,000,000 which Sir Henry expects to be earn. ed this year. Next year he expects a | net operating surplus of $30,000,000, but even this will not be sufficient to offset those burdensome capital charges. This gives some idea of the great problem which faces the head of the national railways, and gives cause for admiration of the man who has brought about the great change in the prospects of the system. In the period during which he has been at the head of the system, Sir Henry Thornton has more than justi- ved the expectations of the govern- ment which appointed him. Outside of a few rabid politicians, who re- fuse to see the light even when the sun [s blazing jn their eyes, even those who criticized the appointment will be ready to admit that it was a wise one, and that Sir Henry has done splendid work since coming to this country. What has already been done is but a foretaste of what will be done in the future, and with de- finite prospects that in 'three years time even the burdemsome capital charges will be overcome, the future of the Canadian National Railway system is indeed a bright one. ------ -- -- -------- MONEY AT WORK Markets. Stocks, Be - and Inveatmente an GERMANS Clarence Ludlow Brownell, M.A, Fellow Royal Geogra, ical Bootes he Londen, England, is Richard Henry Little sald that. were put on the points of a cambire needle, it could roll in a straight line for 10,000 years without reach- {ing the edge. Litdle knows. He | studies this honor as it exhibits it- self on both sides of the Atlantic. And now appears a booklet by a Swiss named Wuifshon, and a poilou, Wernle, business men who know how to write and are able to discuss fin- ance and its methods in a convincing way. These gentlemen explain how the members of German corporations have been able to fleece their friends, their stockholders and the public; deceive the German government and accumulate by strategy great sums of money in banks outside of ihe Fatherland--how in short they have pumped Germany dry. By "dry" they megn that so much money and so much"stock have found an abiding place in repositories be- yond the reach of the German gov. ernment levies and the reach of Ger- many's creditors, that there is not enough of either left to begin to pay the demands of France, x : Not in Germany. German wealth is not in Germany. German individuals have become al- most impossibly wealthy, but these tremendous fortunes are in the hands of dummies which the men of means have created to escape taxa- tion, reparations, or any legal pay- ments in the Fatherland as far as possible. 'Furthermore, by the use of these dummles in Switzerland, for instance or in Spain, or Sweden, or Holland, where "getting Dutch" means success, a few capitalists, di- rectors of great concerns, have been able to beggar hundreds of thous- ands of stockholders who have known nothing of the intrigues with the dummies, and to bribe the work. | ing people close to starvation. In- cidentally marks have sunk to two thousand billion to the Canadian dol- lar. To save their own skins, the great German financiers have done this. The opportunity came to them, and they could not resist it. It has given them immense influence in several other countries as well as in Ger- many, and had it not been for the League of Nations, they would now have poor little Austria in their hands. : - How did the German capitalists manage to accomplish all this? They were well equipped to do it, funda- mentally, by having no regard for German law und not even a vestige of a conscience. These essentials to success allowed their ingenuity full scope, and when it comes to dodging | and otherwise evading legitimate re- sponsibility, the. dullest German is agile. According to the little book, to cite an instance, "a German mining company needs cables and boilers. A holding company which merely 'holds the bag' for the companies cr the men who do the financial work, buys the stock of a couple of plants, one of which makes boilers and the other wire. é "The next step is to issue new stock. In the holding company are men who buy the new stock of the two plants. New wire stock to the amount of the old stock goes to the boiler Interests, and new boiler stock in amount the equividlent of the or- ginal boller stock goes to the wire people in the holding concern, Each group of buyers pays for the new stock by transferring its stoek to the other group. 'The real owners of the two plants are in Germany, but they are beyond the reach of the govern. ment. The stockholders of the min- .| ing company in Germany are left out in the cold." Near Grefield some wise ones had a steel plant. They also had pre- monitions. They took their stock out of Germany and sold it where the selling was safe (for them). 'With the money they bought German mines. They made the deal through Bwiss banks, and by arrangement with these banks, the financiers ap- pear still to owe a great many of the Swiss francs which were the pur. chase price. That debt is camou- e. A holding company that owned a metal business (in mainz existed merely for the purpose of reducing the amount of property it held in Germany subject to handling by Ger, man officials. The Mainz company Reld shares in Lorraine and Luxem- bourg. It sent these shares to Lu- them. With the of the sale, it bought up a whole of indus- commissioned a Stuttgart Gérman honor in the form of a pili | carne, and the holding company took | BIBBY'S Holiday Sale FIVE OVERCOATS Chesterfields, Ulsters, Ulsterettes--to go at $19.50 200 KNITTED TIES $25.00 OUR $29.50 SUITS BIBBY'S Ss see ves serie enn en All new designs and colors--to goat... 50c. TWENTY-FIVE OVERCOATS Smart Ulsters and Nobby Slip-ons--all new shades and colors --regular $33.50 to $37.50 values--to go at 150 MEN'S FINE SHIRTS . Sizes 14 to 17--to go at vores $1.38 - will make you look like a million dollars -- new Hessingbeue Blues and Browns, Fancy Scotch Tweeds, etc.--all hand-tailored. Pp two bills remains outside Germpany. Werule and Waifsoha say that the stockholders in German plants from which these low billings go out won- der at the small prices. The man- ager explains that the market is oversto and full, also that com. petition i$ keen. This helps with the government, if officials happen to be nosing around. This cunning of the multi-miilion- aires explains the poverty in Ger- many in spite of the activity the visitas sees at the industrial plants. There have been profits but they went to the men who have organized the holding companies in foreign countries. Factories are constantly failing, and then falling Into the hands of the few very rich individual manipulators. There is absolutely no chance whatever for a small con- cern. Concentration has been the order of the day ever since the armis- tice, - It is not political economy, it is crime. The concentration is due to the desire of a few ruthless men to evade and to control. It is desire on the wrong road. They choose be- tween themselves and the Father land. Which shall suffer? "Not us," they say. "The getting was never 30 good before; we shall get all there is to get; we hope that will be every- thing." And their honor might roll for- ever and not traverse the breath of - That Body of Bours By James W, Berton, MD, Where We Live--The Abdomen. Did you ever think of all the dif- ferent organs that are stored away in your abdomen. There is the liver, stomach, pap- creas, intestines, kidpeys and po forth. It would appear as if that part of the body was a sort of furn- ace 'or factory, which had just one thing to manufacture--blood. The blood builds mp every part is made is not protected by the heavy. rk of ribs that we find pro- CHOICE. CONFECTIONERY FOR THE HOLIDAY SEASON SHORTBREAD, FRUIT CAKES, SULTANA CAKES, CHARLOTTE RUSSE, ETC. TELEPHONE ORDERS GIVEN BEST ATTENTION, LACKIE'S 802 KING STREET - - BAKERY - PHONE 2141. Unusual Opportunity For the balance of the week we will give , One-Third Off the marked price of all FRENCH IVORY BOXED PERFUMES STATIONERY As these are principally holiday goods with us, we make this big reduction rather than carry them over from one sea x We have private | funds to loan on T. J. Lockhart | Real Estate and Insurance ' J KINGSTON 58 BROCK 8T., son to another, Dr. Chown's Drug Store 185 Princess Stroct. Phone 343 they were properly developd they ||! hold the abdominal organs in place as snugly as would a pair of corsets. But thers is one most important thing to remember. | When man was created he was meant to move these muscles con- stautly by exercise. There is really no exercise that calls for real effort that does not put the abdominal mus. cles into play. What am 1 trying to teach? 'That if the organs in the abdomen are gol to be held in thelr right positions, and if these organs are go- |} ing to be stimulated to resl healthy action, ten you should see that you use the middle third of your body every day. t rk, sweeping, lifting, golfing, all the athletic games call into play these muscles. They | actually massage the abdominal or-