to the one in which I sat, and I have known him
—when I did not draft the letter—ask
perhaps how to spell a dozen words whilst
writing as many lines. There were some
errors in orthography which he seemed never
to get over. Thus he had apparently an
invincible dislike to double letters, especially
the double p; so that he would aprize his
corespondent to make an apointment to
apropriate shares.

But at accounts few men could equal
Skeeme. Let the cleverest of accountants
jumble together, so as to make them
unintelligible, the capital account of a line, the
debentures, the preference stock and the rolling
stock, he saw through the dodge in ten minutes,
and having separated the wheat from the chaff,
very soon showed how matters ought to be,
and where was truth and where falsehood.
As chairman of the Great Southern he had a
somewhat difficult task to perform. The line
was not paying, and the shareholders were
every year grumbling more and more because it
did not do so. Some of the directors wished to
keep things quiet, "to make matters pleasant,"
by fabricating little dividends, and out of the
capital paying a certain interest so as to
prevent the grumbling becoming too loud. They
were not actually dishonest men—they thought
of their line as Mr. Macawber did of his fortunes,
that some day, sooner or later, "something
would turn up," which would enable
them to repay to the capital what they had
borrowed in order to expend as interest.
And, after all, was not the capital the property
of the shareholders? If you borrowed
a few thousands from it every year, did not
these moneys go into the pockets of these
same shareholders? And what was the use
of telling everything to the great body of
shareholders? Some of them were lawyers,
these were chiefly rogues; others—many—
were women, these were mostly fools; was it
not better to keep things smooth and quiet,
and wait with patience until that something
which they so earnestly expected should turn
up?

I don't say that these were altogether the
opinions of Skeeme, but they were those of
most of his colleagues, and as he was a very
large shareholder in the concern, he wished as
much as possible to keep up the value of his
property. Railway stock was just then
commencing to look very bad indeed. On some
lines the one hundred pounds stock was selling
as low as fifty pounds, forty pounds, and even
thirty pounds. In other companies even the
debenture-holders could get no interest for
their money, and in one or two instances the
preference shareholders were in the same
predicament. Before I had been long in the office,
I saw very clearly what was the end and aim
of Mr. Skeeme's working; in fact, he acknowledged
it to me one day. He held a very large
amount of shares in the Great Southern, and
foreseeing that the system of railway account
cooking could not last for ever, he wanted by
degrees—little by little, so as not to attract
observation to sell out, if not all, the greater
part of his stock, so that when the evil day
came his loss would be comparatively small.
But to do this at the prices which then ruled
would be fully, therefore he was working his
utmost to raise the value of the shares before
he threw his own on the market. He had
promised, when I first joined him, to let me
into any "real good thing" that turned up,
and it was in showing me how he would
befriend me that I discovered the plan he had
of working the oracle to his own advantage.

The shares stood at sixty, and to increase
their value in the market an increase of traffic
or a decrease of expenses must be shown. To
do the latter was impossible—or next to it
—for the reason that every official on the
line, from the traffic manager and secretary
to the policemen and porters, were more or
less the friends and all the nominees—of the
directors. I remember an instance in which
it was attempted to reduce by five per cent
the salaries of all officers who received more
than one hundred pounds a year, and I shall
never forget the storm it raised. Long before
it could be carried out the secretary of the
company was inundated with letters, petitions,
remonstrances, and I know not what, from all,
or nearly all, the shareholders of the line. Mr.
Jones of Stoke Kewington asked whether it
was just that his son (who was deputy-assistant
sub-secretary, and received one hundred
and fifty pounds a year for hindering the
work of the office) should have his salary
reduced by seven pounds ten shillings, at a time
when beef was elevenpence, and the best mutton
thirteenpence a pound? Mr. Williamson of
Swansea wrote to say that he considered it
most infamous that his nephew should, after
working hard for three years in the accountant's
office, be reduced from two hundred pounds to
one hundred and ninety pounds; and Mrs.
James, a large shareholder and extensive
philanthropist, came herself to see the Chairman,
and told him that she would at once throw all
the stock she held upon the market, if the two
Station-masters down the country for whom she
had got places, had their salaries reduced by
five pounds a year each. What could be
done with such people? To reduce the
expenses of the line appeared to be impossible,
and therefore all that could be done was to
increase the receipts: but how?

There was a small fishing village about twenty
miles from our line of railway, of which few
people had ever heard, but which it was
said by Mr. Skeeme and others could easily
be turned into a very fashionable bathing-place.
The local medical men were asked for Statistics
about the health of the place, and such returns
were given that the only wonder is every old
person in the three kingdoms did not
immediately flock there. The place was perfection;
all it wanted was a few streets, and some people
to inhabit them; but, above all things it
required, was a line of railway, and this the