MIDDLE-CLASS EXPENDITURE.
[To THE EDITOR TIIM "SPECTATOR."]
Sin,—There are two points which I think have been missed by your correspondents on the above interesting subject.
(1). There is a large class of professional men, such as schoolmasters, doctors, awl country solicitors, who are obliged to live in a certain style and on a higher scale of expenditure than their income niight warrant, simply because if they do not their income and professional reputation will suffer. A great deal in the way of entertaining and subscriptions, &c., is expected of them; if they fail in these expectations their clients or praetioe will diminish. It is amongst this class that the difficulty of living within their incomes is the most real. It is not always a desire to live as expensively as their neighbours that makes them live up to or over their incomes, but a laudable desire to get on in their profession. (2) In the statistics that several of your correspondents have given with regard to the arrangement per cent. of incomes, not nearly enough is allowed for the odds and ends of expenses that come under no special head. For instance, washing, chemist, dentist, subseriptions, tips, books, newspapers, stationery and postage, household upkeep, the many little friendly helps to others that cannot come under the heading of either charity or presents, and the smaller travelling expenses inevitable to a professional man, form a large item in middle-class expendi- ture. The more successful a man is in his profession, the larger are some of these items,—one would almost say (given the man is not a fool) the larger these items, the more success- ful is the man in his profession. I enclose my card.—I am,
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