THE PILOTS' MONOPOLY. 1&

and no one would employ them. Everybody was derisively grateful
to the association for taking all the worthless pilots out of the way
and leaving the whole field to the excellent and the deserving; and
everybody was not only jocularly grateful for that, but for a result
which naturally followed, namely, the gradual advance of wages as
the busy season approached. Wages had gone up from the low figure

of one hundred dollars a month
to one hundred and twenty-five,
and in some cases to one hundred
and fifty; and it was great fun

to enlarge upon the fact that this
charming thing had been accom-
plished by a body of men not one of
whom received a particle of benefit
from it. Some of the jokers used
to call at the association rooms - ~ - ~
and have a good time chaffing the
members and offering them the charity of taking them as steersmen
for a trip, so that they could see what the forgotten river looked
like. However, the association was content; or at least it gave no
sign to the contrary. 2s"ow and then it captured a pilot who was
* out of luck/ and added him to its list; and these later additions
were very valuable, for they were good pilots; the incompetent ones