OOD service on the part of a public-service corporation gets scant praise. Indifferent or bad service provokes a storm of angry protests. The public are impatient; they demand the best and when they understand the situation are usually willing to pay for it. Referring particularly to the electric lighting company, the idea is rapidly gaining ground that the interests of the company and the citizens are mutual. Increased business and profits make for lower rates. On the other hand, decreased earnings and a spirit of hostility to the company result in less business and higher rates. In enumerating the advantages of Minneapolis one seldom hears that the city possesses one of the finest electric light and power systems in America. Yet it I would be much to the advantage of the citizens and the company to proclaim this fact as an important point in municipal advertising.

One has but to think of the conditions prevailing in Minneapolis eight years ago, when three different companies were supplying the city with service at an exorbitant yet unprofitable price, and compare them with the present magnificent combined steam and water power system with its storage batteries and underground distribution, to get an idea of what Stone & Webster have accomplished for Minneapolis during the brief period of their management.

At that time the service was intolerable. Break-downs were frequent. The city was paying $118 per year for each are light and the price of electricity was twenty cents per kilowatt hour. With a population of 200,000, the total gross earnings were only $263,000. To-day, with a population of 300,000, the gross earnings are over $920,000, or in other words with an increase in population of less than fifty per cent the earnings have

increased over two hundred per cent, and that too, in spite of the fact that the price has been gradually declining until it now shows a reduction of nearly fifty per cent. To-day the company proposes to furnish the most modern type of street are lamp for $67.50 per year and reduce the price of light to the citizens to ten cents per kilowatt hour.

As an evidence of the confidence that Stone & Webster have in the future of the City of Minneapolis they have just completed a new 24,000 horse-power plant at Taylors Falls which is one of the finest examples of hydro-electric construction in America. While this is primarily to take care of the rapidly growing demand for power, it is expected that this great increase in capacity will result in a corresponding increase in the use of electricity for light and industrial purposes and consequently make it possible to sell it at a price even lower than the ten-cent rate now proposed.

This point was clearly brought out by the manager of The Minneapolis General Electric Company in his testimony before the special franchise committee of the City Council, in which he stated that with the increased capacity now available the volume of business done would be the vital feature in securing a still further reduction in the cost of current.

The terms of the franchise which The Minneapolis General Electric Company are now seeking emphasizes most emphatically the mutuality of interest on the part. of the company and the citizens. It virtually takes the city into partnership in that it provides for private ownership under municipal control, and the interests of both are fully protected. It represents the best thinking on the part of the leading authorities in this country, and when accepted will give Minneapolis the distinction of being one of the first cities to solve the problem of its public-service corporations.

Up in the Great Northwest a wonderful movement of immigration promises to develop during 1908, and many inquiries are being received by reliable land companies regarding the opportunity for investment, and the resources of the great country lying tributary to the Twin Twin Cities and the Head of the Lakes.

A representative of THE WORLD TO-DAY had a personal interview with Mr. T. F. Danaher, at his office in the Railway Building, Minneapolis, Minn., regarding the conditions and opportunity for investment. Mr. Danaher is one of the big builders of this section, and enjoys the confidence and respect of the leading business and financial interests of the Northwest. Mr. Danaher said: "Put your money in land; it is never a gamble. Fourteen years ago I was dealing in Northern Iowa and Southwestern Minnesota farm lands, and they were cheap at that time. Land was then selling for from eight to ten dollars per acre that you can't buy for sixty dollars to-day. However, at that time it was necessary to use considerable argument to convince a man that these lands were a good investment. Many tracts were still open to homesteaders, and some big railroad grants were unsold. Since then, people have seen all these lands go into the hands of small holders, and rise every year in price. They have witnessed the same thing in South Dakota, North Dakota and Manitoba, and it isn't necessary to argue any more that cheap land in a new section is

a good investment. To clinch this argument came the 'panic' of 1907, when the financial world was trembling, stocks falling, and investments of every other character dropping in value. It was the farmer with his seven-billion dollar crop that saved the country,

"The New Northwest, the prairie region they used to consider unfit for farming, was the most prosperous of all. Its land yielded bigger crops and a better quality, and netted more money than any other section in the United States. There is still cheap land in this new Northwest, and it is ready to reward the farmer with abundant crops. Those now on the ground have proved what it can do. The last of the cheap land in this new country will be marketed within the next year or two. Railroads are opening it up. The Milwaukee road's new coast extension, through Montana and the Billings and Northern Line to Great Falls, will open up some of the last tracts to be sold."

Mr. Danaher has made extensive preparations to handle his share of the big trend of immigration that promises to settle and invest in these agricultural lands during 1908. The homeseeker or farmer in the Middle West who is obtaining a meager living from his highpriced lands, and the small farmer who is making a scant income after paying high rent, would do well to write Mr. Danaher regarding the golden opportunities yet offered in this great country.

The greatest deposits of iron ore in the world are found within her borders, and although it is only twenty years since the first iron ore was shipped from the state, she is now supplying sixty-five per cent of the iron of the United States, while vast additional deposits are being discovered every year.

In agriculture, Minnesota is outstripping her neighbors, and already stands fourth in the agricultural products, as compared with the forty-six states of the Union. There is a growth from $6,748,707 in 1860, to $113,092,602 in 1900.

In the production of live stock she has done especially well. Her healthy climate, fertile soil and pure waters make Minnesota particularly adapted to stock-raising. The dairy products of the state have grown, in recent years, to command world-wide attention. Minnesota butter is known for its superior quality in all the butter markets, and stands at the head of all competitors in the tests of America, holding four of the prize banners out of six in the competitive tests in the United States.

In manufacturing, she has done equally well, her products in 1860 amounting to $4,295,208, and in 1905, $307,858,073.

The mining and lumbering, together with the numerous manufacturing industries, have developed three large, commercial centers, viz.: St. Paul, Minneapolis and Duluth, in addition to many smaller cities, which makes a domestic market unequaled by any other state.

This, combined with Minnesota's im

Minnesota boasts of the finest school system in America. The public school forms a basis for a complete course of education through the innumerable high schools, culminating in the University of Minnesota, which is recognized as one of the best institutions of learning in the United States. The schools of the state are augmented by the permanent school fund, secured from the sale of state lands, which it is estimated will soon amount to $100,000,000. This enormous fund has been safeguarded by our lawmakers so that only the interest can be used, the principal being kept intact.

The above may seem extravagant when the reader is informed that not over forty per cent of the farm land is yet under cultivation, and cause him to ask why is Minnesota not more fully developed. The only answer the writer can give, is that the opportunities offered in every branch of industry are unknown to the people desirous of securing new homes.

There are 2,154,255 acres of Federal lands open to homestead. The state owns 2,500,000 acres of school lands, a part of which will be offered for sale at public auction during the month of July, 1908, in the following counties: Itasca, St. Louis, Carlton, Aitkin, Clearwater, Beltrami, Cass, Hubbard, Wadena, Kittson, Marshall, Roseau, Becker, Morrison, Mille Lacs, Koochiching and Pine.

State lands can be purchased by a cash payment of fifteen per cent, with forty years' time on the balance at four per cent interest. Full information, regarding state lands, can be had by writing S. G. Iverson, State Auditor, St. Paul.

The last legislature created a Board of Immigration, and now complete authentic information, relative to the State of Minnesota and her opportunities, will be furnished by addressing GEORGE WELSH, Commissioner of Immigration, St. Paul, Minnesota.

liquor habit.

F the Minneapolis institutions founded in the city none have become more prominent or have gained as wide reputation in their respective lines of business as the Murray Cure for the

This Institution was founded in 1896 by Edwin Murray, who, with no assets but the formula of the treatment and ambition to make the Murray Cure the leading treatment of its kind in the world, began business in a small dwelling house with a single patient at 1212 First Avenue, South, at which place he was located for about eighteen months when he had to secure larger quarters at 137 Tenth Street, North.

A VIEW OF THE MAIN PARLOR

Within eight months his business had outgrown this location and Dr. Murray secured the larger and more pretentious site at 1819 Nicollet Avenue, at which place he conducted the business until December 7, 1906, when he died after a short illness.

After the death of Dr. Murray, his wife, Catherine Murray, who also had much experience in Institute work, incorporated the business as the Murray

Cure Institute Company, of which she is president and treasurer; and and was fortunate in securing as Medical Director Dr. R. M. Peters, one of the foremost physicians and surgeons in the city of Minneapolis, and who was consulting physician for seven years at the Institute prior to Dr. Murray's death.

Mr. J. J. Baker was retained as manager, he also having acted in that capacity for Dr. Murray, and being educated in the business by him.

obtainable, graduate nurses only being The corps of attendants are the best employed; and Mr. Duncan Morrison, who is superintendent of nurses, has had twenty years' experience and has three diplomas as graduate nurse.

During the eleven years the Institute has been in operation over five thousand patients have been treated, and of these, ninety per cent have remained in the same condition in which they left the Institute.

On the 12th of April, 1907, the Institute was moved to its new home at 620 Tenth Street, South, this beautiful place having been purchased and furnished newly throughout, and making it the peer of any institute of its kind in the world to-day; the accompanying cut shows the main parlor and the same air of elegance prevails throughout the entire place.

As to references and as to the treatment being conducted ethically, all that is necessary to say is that the Murray Cure has the endorsement of leading physicians and surgeons, hospitals, railroads, public officials, banks and leading business men of the city, and also of the Humane Society and the leading clergymen ; and we claim, and justly so, that the Murray Institute is the only institute of its kind in the world to-day that is endorsed as strongly by leading people in the city in which it is located, as well as throughout the entire country wherever it is known.