principal market, La Halle, is known all over France for its public auctions. Accommodation is provided for 276 stalls, rented at 14 cents a day per square meter for fruit, vegetables and cheese, while other stalls for meat and fish are rented at 33 cents per square meter.

At the morning auctions, held at the rear of the hall, are sold immense quantities of fish, oysters, lobsters, game, poultry, butter, cheese, eggs, fruit and vegetables. There is a rule that all supplies must come from outside Lyons, so that local store men cannot there dispose of surplus stocks, but dealers in other French cities often thus relieve themselves when overloaded. These auctions not only enable local dealers to distribute supplies at cheap rates to the small stores all over the city, but wide awake housewives can frequently tell just what the stores gave wholesale for the produce offered to them retail later in the day, so a check can be kept on overcharges.

The auctioneers are given a monopoly of selling for ten years, on binding themselves to pay to the city a sum equal to two per cent on the total annual sales. The minimum is fixed at $1,930 for one stand or $5,650 for four stands, to be paid to the municipal treasury. Two per cent is added to the purchase price of every payment made by buyers at auction, and if this does not amount to $1,930 per stand for the year, the auctioneer has to make up the difference. The poorer classes benefit largely by these sales, banding together to buy wholesale and then dividing their purchases.

A DRASTIC INSPECTION
Of Refrigerated Chinese Pork at the Port of Liverpool.

There are also seventeen markets for general retail trade in Lyons. The Terminal Market of La Halle cost the city $886,980. The company which built it was given a concession for fifty years, on a division of profits arrangement, but within sixteen months the utility of the market as an advantageous enterprise for the city was so clearly demonstrated that the municipality bought the company out.

Austria-Hungary

Vienna, with 1,700,000 people to supply, has a magnificently managed system of forty-five markets, seven of which are located in large, well-ventilated halls, all kept spotlessly clean.

Market commissioners appointed by the municipality conduct the business of the markets according to strict regulations, enforcing a rigid inspection of all products as well as weights and measures. Violations of these rules are punishable by fines of about $2.00, imprisonment for 24 hours or exclusion from the markets. Such penalties are enforced when buyers are defrauded, dealers oppose the market authority, or exceed the charges that are posted in the market.

Not merely land and water produce, but general farm and household requisites, are sold at these markets. Outside buying is strictly controlled, owners of boats on the Danube or wagons on the public streets paying toll to the municipality on any sales.

Over $60,000 profit is the average annual yield of the markets to the city treasury, and it is generally agreed that the market system tends to keep down the price of foodstuffs to normal levels.

Buda-pesth has 715,000 people and a very complete market system, under which, though only nominal rentals are charged, there is a profit of over $100,000.

There is one large wholesale terminal market, while six local markets cater for the retail requirements of all quarters of the city. All salesmen are carefully selected; criminals and diseased persons being rigidly excluded. Though a wide variety of articles are sold in the smaller markets besides farm produce, storekeepers are not allowed to rent stalls, so the market men and farmers alone have the use of the buildings. The regulations under which they trade were drawn up by a market commission and confirmed by ministerial decrees. These regulations are regarded in Europe as a model of comprehensiveness and their observance ensures close attention to hygiene. Among the rules is one insisting on the placing of all waste paper in the public refuse receptacles, while another compels the use of new, clean paper only in wrapping up food products.

Stalls are rented from four to ten cents a day, according to the accommodation. Supplies come by boat, rail and wagon, and when there is pressure on the interior market space sales are allowed from the boats and wagons at a toll of ten cents a day. Otherwise only merchandise is allowed to be sold outside the market halls. Not only must no fish, game, meat or poultry be sold without first being passed by the veterinary inspectors, but none of these articles of diet must be brought to market packed in straw, cloth or paper. Unripe fruit must not be sold to children.

Every day a bulletin issued by the market commission sets out the wholesale prices, while a weekly list gives the retail prices, but in the latter case the note is added that the market commission will not be responsible for any controversy that may arise. All the stocks held by the market traders are insured by the municipality, though not to their full value.

Not only have these markets proved beneficial to the consumers generally, but the market men are unanimous as to their advantage, for they afford a ready and inexpensive means of doing a large business.

Holland

Amsterdam, with a population of 510,000, has all the local markets under the control of the municipality. They are divided into five districts, each managed by a director or market master, responsible to the city council.

Two of the markets are covered, but the remainder are open and are situated by the side of the canals, along which the produce is brought in boats from the farms around. On the administration of the markets in an average year there is a profit of $36,000, but there is a law against making a profit on municipal enterprises, so the surplus is spent on local improvements.

Rotterdam, another great Dutch seaport, operates its markets under similar conditions and makes a profit of $34,000, of which $23,000 comes from the cattle and meat markets.

Belgium

Brussels, possessing a population of half a million, reaps considerable advantage from its picturesque municipal markets, four of which are covered, while several are in the open air.

The renting of space to standholders at the central market is according to the highest bidder, provided the price is not below $11.58 per month for meat, $9.65 for poultry and game, $5.79 for fruit, vegetables, butter and cheese.

Both producers and dealers sell at these markets, all their supplies being subjected to drastic inspection regulations. All meats are tested by the municipal veterinary surgeon and his staff, while a communal chemist regulates the milk, butter and general dairy produce. The cleansing of the markets is done by the department of public cleanliness. Some of the public markets are managed by a contractor, who receives $250.90 a year for setting up the stalls and keeping them in good order. He deposits a security on undertaking his contract and in default of a