Read "The Clock that Had no Hands" by Herbert Kaufman online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
Circulation is a commodity which must be bought with the same common sense used in selecting potatoes, cloth and real estate. "It can be measured and weighed" -- it is "merchandise" with a "provable" value. It varies just as much as the grocer's green stuff, the tailor's fabrics and the lots of the real estate man.
Your cook refuses to accept green and rotten tomatoes at the price of perfect ones. She does not calculate the number of vegetables that are "delivered" to her, but those that she "can use". When your wife selects a piece of cloth she first makes sure that it will serve the purpose she has in view. When you buy a piece of property you consider "the neighborhood" as well as the "ground". Just so when you buy "advertising" you must find out how much of the circulation you "can use". You must judge the "neighborhoods" where your copy will be read, with the same thoughtfulness that you devoted to selecting the spot where your goods are sold.