Marchant

“ Through the doors of the different rooms passed an endless procession; men from the front with the marks of the desert sun on their faces—engineers, superintendents, bosses, messengers, agents—servants of the Company; laborers of every sort and nationality came in answer to the cry: "Men wanted!"; special salesmen from foundry, factory and shop drawn by prospective large sales of machinery, implements and supplies; land-hungry men from everywhere seeking information and opportunity for investment. ”

“ First, the gentleman farmer, or husbandman, sends his wool to the market, which is bought either by the comber or spinster, and they, the next week, bring it hither again in yarn, which the weaver buys, and the market following brings that hither again in cloth, when it is sold, either to the clothier, who sends it to London, or to the merchant, who, after it hath passed the fuller's mill, and sometimes the dyer's vat, transports it. ”

“ The factor often provides a store, together with a complete selling and office force, and every facility for receiving, storing, selling, and shipping the goods, and for financing the business. The salesmen of the house travel throughout the country, reaching all the important markets, and the managers of the different departments, who thus understand the needs of the market, are in a position to advise the mill with intelligence and exactness as to the kind of goods which should be made to meet the requirements of the trade. ”

“ If trouble could make a plain man look like that, surely it could not be unmixed disaster! That was the thought in Bertha’s mind for the remainder of the day, and though she tried to escape it she could not. All her life she had worshipped beauty wherever she could find it. Tom Ellis had seemed hitherto to be only a struggling unlettered farmer, more intent on making money than improving his intellectual standing; but the blow which might have felled a less noble soul had left him standing erect and strong, so surely the disaster had wrought him only good. ”

“ Those brutes of keepers who beat you told me that at the first touch of the lash you gave a terrible jump the length of your chain. But, you see, friend Bull, if I offer you to the purchasers with the dangerous account which you give, I shall find few customers. An honest merchant should not boast his merchandise too much, no more should he underestimate it. ”

“ We draw such fine distinctions between the wholesale and retail traders that our cotton-spinners, calico-makers, and general merchants seem to think that they belong to a totally different sphere, from which they look down on the lady who has had sufficient brains, capital, and courage to open a shop. ”

“ For a tradesman to open his shop in a place unresorted to, or in a place where his trade is not agreeable, and where it is not expected, it is no wonder if he has no trade. What retail trade would a milliner have among the fishmongers' shops on Fishstreet-hill, or a toyman about Queen-hithe? When a shop is ill chosen, the tradesman starves; he is out of the way, and business will not follow him that runs away from it: suppose a ship-chandler should set up in Holborn, or a block-maker in Whitecross Street, an anchor-smith at Moorgate, or a coachmaker in Redriff, and the like! ”

“ But the amazing thing was that a frail old man knelt at her feet, his straggling white hair hanging down on the collar of his coat, his hands clasped in entreaty, while he was speaking in a high-pitched wavering voice, pleading as if his life depended on his gaining the thing for which he asked. ”

“ The sphere of trade of this body of exporting merchants extended along the coasts of France, the Netherlands, and Germany, opposite England, and some distance into the interior. [Footnote: Ibid,, xxvi.] It is true that the Merchants Adventurers had many mediaeval features which assimilated them more to the old merchant and craft guilds than to the more modern type of chartered commercial companies which were about to come into existence. They had, like the craft guilds, a system of apprenticeship and different degrees of advancement in their membership. ”

“ Most wholesale merchants are content to confine themselves to one branch of trade: lumber, iron, wool, leather, grain, etc. Most of these merchants, moreover, rely further on specialists to help them with certain parts of their business. They depend constantly on the banker, the speculator, the broker, the forwarder, the warehouseman, the commission merchant, and agents of many different kinds. It is impossible, in this book, to do more than suggest the complex commercial organization which has grown up in the course of the century. ”

“ I am obliged to call him a négociant, as marchand means a shop-keeper; nay, a dealer in the pettiest wares is called a merchant: a seller of milk is a marchand de lait. As for shops, they have disappeared: every shop is a magasin, so that France is not a nation boutiquière, whatever England may be. ”

“ Tears of disappointment welled up in Nell’s dark eyes, for the candid opinion and friendly advice of the doctor came as a great blow to her, shattering many a magnificent castle in the air. No one but herself knew how ardently she had longed to rise above the drudgery of ordinary life, and to make for herself a name and a place among the extremely cultured of the world. ”

“ Katherine sighed as she went back to help with the unlading of the boat. It was a great comfort to feel that her father suffered nothing either in body or mind, but sometimes she would have been very thankful if she could have gone to him with her business worries, and got his advice on things which perplexed her so much. However, it was something to be thankful for that his burden of apprehension was lifted so completely, and the thought of this banished her tendency to sighing, bringing the smiles back instead. Life might be hard, but while there was hope in it, it could not be unbearable. ”

“ The Warners ceased their supper to listen and look; and they saw emerging from the woods, and rolling down the hill at a brisk trot, the cart of one of those itinerant tin merchants, who originate in New England, and travel from one end of the Union to the other, avoiding the cities, and seeking customers amongst the country people; who, besides buying their ware, always invite them to a meal and a bed. ”

“ Once the merchant has opened his store or shop and purchased his goods he seeks to establish trade relations with as many individual customers as he can attract. Mercantile business is carried on in two kinds of stores, those which supply one kind of goods in wholesale or retail quantities, like groceries or dry goods, and those which maintain numerous departments for different kinds of manufactured goods. ”

“ Men also sold the products of their own labor, not only food products, such as bread, meat, and fish, but also objects of manufacture, as cloth, arms, leather, and goods made of wood, leather, or metal. For the protection and regulation of this trade the organization (p. 061) known as the gild merchant had grown up in each town. The gild merchant seems to have included all of the population of the town who habitually engaged in the business of selling, whether commodities of their own manufacture or those they had previously purchased. ”

“ Pam sobbed on until she had no more tears to shed, then she gathered her courage to face what lay before her. She realized that she was up against the hardest thing she had ever faced in her life; and she was going to meet it boldly if she could. Her courage might feel like water, but other people must not know it. For the sake of her grandfather, who had so mysteriously disappeared, she must stay on at Ripple and do her best. The thought of running a farm tickled her so much that her tears were dry, and she was laughing when Sophy crept back to see how it was with her. ”

“ Katherine drew a long breath, and her eyes were still misty. "How long the waiting time must seem to Mary, and the months can bring her no tidings of what she most wants to know."
"That is true; but I am quite sure it is good for her," Mr. Selincourt answered. "Never before has there been anything in her life which called for waiting or patience, and it is the lessons which are hardest to learn which do us most good." ”

“ Each merchant could ship on his own a certain number of cloths each year, the number depending on the length of his membership in the company. He could sell them himself or by his factor at the place where the company had privileges of market. Strict rules governed the conduct of each member. He was to make sales only at certain hours on specified days. All disagreements were to be settled by the company's governor, or his deputy in residence, and those officials dealt with such disputes as arose between members of the company and continental officials and buyers. ”

“ Katherine looked at the tops of the pine trees again, but, finding no help there, let her gaze drop to the dancing water, and finally faltered in a very low voice: "Because love is better than money, or that sort of thing." ”

“ The merchant gilds.—Much more might be said about the general characteristics of the medieval town, but the student of the history of commerce must devote most of his time to its economic life. He must prepare himself to accept and understand conditions quite different from those of modern times, and must try to realize how much the world has gained by the advance of the commercial organization from these early stages. In every town the merchants and manufacturers were organized in gilds and subject to strict regulation. ”

“ Out of the wild confusion of facts and from behind the fog of guesses—contradicted almost as soon as they are born—a stately picture makes its appearance, like an Alpine chain suddenly emerging in all its grandeur from the mists which concealed it the moment before, glittering under the rays of the sun in all its simplicity and variety, in all its mightiness and beauty. ”

“ No one would have called Nell, otherwise Eleanor Hamblyn, at this period of her life, a pretty girl. Two good points, however, she possessed: one a sweet, low voice, that excellent thing in woman; the other a pair of beautiful luminous eyes, which made those who saw them forget the defects of her face and figure.
“You never are on hand when you are wanted. What you find to do in that old loft all the time just about passes my comprehension,” growled the old man, whose temper was none of the sweetest. ”

“ For a mercer to set up now in Paternoster Row, or a woollen-draper in St Paul's Churchyard, the one among the sempstresses, and the other among the chair-makers, would be the same thing as for a country shopkeeper not to set up in or near the market-place. [15]
The place, therefore, is to be prudently chosen by the retailer, when he first begins his business, that he may put himself in the way of business; and then, with God's blessing, and his own care, he may expect his share of trade with his neighbours. ”

“ Tell the Great Father that there is only one store here, and all the young men are shedding tears about it. If they had mowing-machines, such as they could ride upon, to ride around their country and cut hay, they would be able to earn something; but the agent considers that the country belongs to him personally, and cuts all the hay. My friends, I would like to have our agent, before the sun goes down, climb up into the second story of the warehouse and take down all the teepee cloths and blankets that he has there, and divide them among the people. ”

“ If the state of the market were such as to yield a remunerating profit on the produce of those mills they would be in full operation, and would, in that case, give employment to about 25,000 persons more than were then employed. ”

“ They say there has been a sort of homespun-looking old fellow, that nobody seems to know, following the commissioners of sales round, from place to place, with an old horse and cart, seemingly loaded with wooden ware, or some such kind of gear, for peddling; and that he has bid off a great part of all the farms, and stock on them, which have been sold, paying down for them on the spot in hard money, which they say he carries about with him tied up in old stockings, and hid away in his load of trumpery. ”

“ It is true, therefore, of every particular producer or dealer, that a great demand, a brisk circulation, a rapid consumption, of the commodities which he sells at his shop or produces in his manufactory, is important to him. The dealer whose shop is crowded with customers, who can dispose of a product almost the very moment it is completed, makes large profits, while his next neighbour, with an equal capital but fewer customers, gains comparatively little. ”

“ The merchant has his snug retreat in the vicinity of the metropolis, where he often displays as much pride and zeal in the cultivation of his flower-garden, and the maturing of his fruits, as he does in the conduct of his business, and the success of a commercial enterprise. ”

“ This especially respects those people, who deal in heavy goods, as wholesale grocers, salters, brasiers, iron-merchants, wine-merchants, and the like; but does not exclude the dealers in woollen manufactures, and especially in mercery goods of all sorts, the dealers in which generally manage their business in this manner. ”

“ The active, original-minded tradesman, seeing that, with an ordinary share of the entire business of his department, he can scarcely make bread and butter, bethinks him of setting up a leviathan shop, in which he may serve the whole town with mercery at a comparatively small profit to himself, looking to large and frequent returns for his remuneration. ”