In some interesting notes on American topics which the Times
published from its New York correspondent on Monday there is a revelation of the methods of the Standard Oil Trust. The complicated and almost impossible system under which inter-State business is controlled has made it possible for the Trust to evade the law in oountless ways. It adopted a variety of names in order to wreck weaker competitors in different States. Itbas destroyed many of its books, and it defies , both Federal and State Courts. It is said that the highest officials cannot explain its accounts. Millions of money appear to change from one name to another ; now they are debited to an employe, who is astonished when he bears of it; now they are credited to another, who seems to have as little toncern in the matter. The attorneys tried, hard to secure privacy in the Federal suit; and no wonder, for when the Court had refused the request, the rates at which the Trust supplied lubricating-oil to eighty-one railways were laid bare, as well as its relations with all its customers. The dis- criminations in some cases amounted to fifty per cent. The Courts ,apparently aim. at nothing. less than dissolving this
corporation. It is a heavy task ; but if they succeed they will have struck a telling blow for more humanaand legitimate methods of business.
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