Association, of persons for whose intention to hold
and not part with their shares that company
would be answerable, there were the names of
Albert Grass, Frederick Grass, Caroline Grass,
Mary Grass, Ann Grass, Jane Grass, Israel Grass,
Isaac Grass, and Jacob Grass. All these, I found
out, were the children of our worthy director, the
eldest being a boy of fifteen, and the youngest a
baby in arms. Amongst these nine young
speculators a thousand shares were asked for, and,
coming through the Universal Financial, they
were allotted in full. This made a profit of about
ten thousand pounds for our Anglo-German, to
say nothing of what he must make by the share
he had had in the different other advantages he
had derived from the company. At last, after a
vast deal of trouble, and with Wilson and myself
sitting up two whole nights at the work, the
"letters of allotment and regret" were posted,
to the number of not less than ten thousand.

The promotion money to which I was
entitled was twenty thousand pounds, and
this I could take either in shares at par or
in money. Seeing, however, to what a
premium our scrip had advanced, I, of course,
elected to have the shares allotted to me.
Accordingly, each share being calculated at ten
pounds paid up, two thousand were entered in
my name. These I at once sold at a premium
of fifteen pounds, so that in addition to the
twenty thousand pounds, the value of the shares
at par, I realised twenty-five thousand pounds
premium, making altogether forty-five thousand
pounds, which had to be divided between Mr.
Wilson and myself, but of which, according to
our agreement, the ever-present Mr. Grass
claimed a fourth, he being now, in point of fact,
a third promoter of the company. This,
however, I disputed.

So soon as the shares were allotted, the struggle
to get them up to a higher premium than ever
began. The Universal Financial Association,
being large shareholders, and having also
numerous friends who held shares, was greatly
interested in running them up. The only way to
accomplish this was by not seeking or offering
to sell them, and, as the great majority of our
shareholders were wealthy, the plan was easy
enough to carry out. In the mean time,
their value had somewhat fallen, owing to a
report—got up on purpose—that the
committee of the Stock Exchange had determined
on refusing us a settling day. So insidiously
was this story circulated, and so visible day
by day was the decline in the quotation of
our shares, that I congratulated myself upon
having sold mine while they stood at fifteen
premium. From fifteen premium to thirteen,
ten, eight, and by degrees as low as one and a
half to two premium, they declined, until one
day they reached par, and were even quoted as
low as one-eighth discount. Even I was
completely bewildered in my conjectures as to the
reason of this. At last, one day, by mere chance, I
found myself in a railway carriage on the Brighton
line, with a gentleman whom I had formerly
known very well indeed, but of whom I had
for some years lost sight. As he took his
seat, and shook hands with me, it flashed
suddenly across me that he was a member of the
Stock Exchange Committee, and might, perhaps,
give me some insight into the why and the wherefore
of our settlement being refused. I did not
rush at the subject, but brought it about so
gradually that we were well over more than half
our journey before I put the question to him.
Upon my asking whether it was true that we
had been refused a settlement, he at once
replied: " Refused! No; how could we refuse
you a settlement? In the first place, it is barely
a week since your application was sent in, and I
am not breaking confidence in telling you, who,
being one of the officials of the company, must
be aware, that your papers are all correct, as
far as we can see, and to-morrow or next day,
as soon as he has time, the secretary will inform
you officially that you have been granted a
settlement, and that you are to be quoted on the
daily official list."

This reply staggered me; and the more so
because all our directors who were known to
buy and sell scrip, had for the last three weeks
been more desponding than any one else respecting
our prospects of a settlement. I did not
question my friend any more, but, upon
reaching Brighton, at once sent a telegram to
Wilson, telling him to purchase for the next
settlement as many shares of the Rio Grande
as he could lay hands on, even if he paid four, five,
six, eight or ten premium for them. I did not see
by whom the trick had been played,but l felt quite
confident that there was fraud somewhere. In
two days' time the truth got out that we
were to be granted a settlement. There were
then many persons who wanted to buy, and
no one who would sell shares. It turned out
after a little time that nearly all our shares
had been bought up when they were at such
low quotations, by Mr. Grass, Mr. Watson,
Mr. Wood, and their friends, who had combined
in a body first to run down, then to buy, aftewards
to cry up, and to end by selling at a
handsome profit all our shares that they could lay
hands on. The whole affair was left in the
hands of Mr. Grass, who bought and sold the
shares with the greatest nicety, never leaving
even the smallest margin by which he could
be, to use his own elegant expression, " put in
the pot." Of the general public, to whom a
certain portion of our shares had been allotted in
the first place, very few indeed had not parted
with their scrip.

But the devil is ever true to his own. It
was found that nearly all the shares were in
the one set of hands. A number of persons had
sold scrip for the settlement, and now they
could not find any to buy what they had sold.
The prices went up faster than they had gone
down. Still no sellers. Only here and there small
parcels of scrip was to be had. When the truth
of the story got out, the outside share-jobbing
public was furious. It was not so much that
they objected to what had been done, as to
having been done themselves, and those who