til Father Time smashed his glass, that
returned 100 per cent. gross profit on the business done in it, while
the business done in any other staple did not return, gross, over ten to
eighteen per cent.; which gross profit gave to the capital invested in
copper a net profit of sixteen to twenty-five per cent., while that
invested in the other staples returned a net profit of only three and
three-fourths to four and one-fourth per cent.[18] The value of money
had decreased with the world's development; the cost of the great
commodities of life had all come down with the decline in interest--all
but copper, which kept its old places throughout all the changes that
had occurred in the relations of capital to labor and business. I
realized that copper, in that year, would afford a gross profit of 100
cents on each $2 worth produced; that this great gross profit was
legitimate, was not brought about through unfair restrictions or forced
combination, or evasion of the country's laws, but was wholly natural,
being founded on the fact that the supply was so limited that the demand
prevented the price dropping below a certain figure, and that this under
ordinary circumstances represented at least 100 per cent. of gross
profit to the producer after he had paid for labor and material the
highest ruling prices.

No better illustration of the main facts about copper can be found than
the condition of the industry to-day, in 1905. The metal is now fifteen
and a half cents per pound, and the consumption so great that the price
still advances, yet if through an agreement among the producing mines
this sales-rate should be dropped twenty-five per cent., it would so
increase consumption as to force back the price to a point that would
again discourage consumption; and yet in the old mines the cost of
producing the metal sold at fifteen and a half is but six to seven and a
half cents, in some even lower.

Compare these conditions with those existing in the steel industry.
Therein unlawful combinations and unnatural restrictions are essential
if those engaged would show a gross profit of even fifteen per cent. on
their gross output. If more than fair or going returns are earned, then
new capital flows into competition and the surplus again shrinks to an
uninviting point. The same is true in wheat, corn, and cotton--big
prices invite fresh investments and the planting of broader acreage.
Hence the sorry spectacle of the cotton planter who,