40,000_ on this fish trade.

[Illustration: INSIDE SMITHFIELD MARKET

The City of London Corporation's $1,940,000 Terminal--one of the Aisles
with Wholesale Stands on each side.]

On the wholesale and retail meat, fruit, vegetable and fish market at
Leadenhall there is also a profit of over $5,000.

_On the entire municipal market enterprises of the city there is a
profit of $156,000._ The markets are regarded with especial interest by
the Corporation and the Committee which regulates them is considered
one of the most important in the whole administration of the city. In
order to keep abreast of the times most of the profit is expended on
improvements and extensions.

Covent Garden, London's great fruit, flower and vegetable market, is
owned by the Duke of Bedford, whose family have held it for hundreds of
years. In the past century they have spent $730,000 on extensions and
improvements. Of the present modern buildings, the fruit hall cost
$170,000 and the flower building $243,000. Formerly the producers were
chiefly concerned in the market, holding their stands at a yearly
rental. But with the expansion of London the growers have gradually
given place to dealers and commission men, who pay twenty-five cents a
day per square foot of space, and on the produce, at a regular scale,
according to its nature. On flowers there is no toll, but each stand
holder pays a fixed rental. Though this market has direct access
neither to river nor railroad, it still retains its premier position
among the wholesale markets of England. As the approaches are extremely
narrow, most of the produce has to be carried on the heads of hundreds
of porters from the wagons outside into the market buildings. As it is
under private ownership, no figures are issued, but there is known to
be a huge profit on the market. For outer London there are fruit and
vegetable markets at Stratford, in the east, Kew in the west, the
Borough in the south and two railroad markets in the north.

BIRMINGHAM, England's chief midland city, has owned its markets since
1824, administering them through a markets and fairs committee. Since
1908 the profits have been somewhat reduced, owing to outlay on
improvements and extensions; but although the city has expended
$2,156,362 on the markets, the profits have paid off more than half of
that indebtedness, besides relieving taxation in other directions.

Not far away is the small city of KIDDERMINSTER, that may be m