The Sun.
London, England, 1868-08-07 00:00:00

ATLANTIC AND GREAT WESTERN.

The traffic receipts on thin company's lines
amounted for the second week in July to $85,427,
and for the corresponding wetl last year to $95,888,
showing a decrease of $10,461.

-
£1,000,000, wider the power of the recent Act
18G8, and with the sanction of the Secretary of
State for India.

The proceedings concluded with a vote of thanks
o the chairman.

LIABILITY al,' .101 NT STOCK COMPANY

MANAGERS.

(From the Anglo • American 7'inzes.)
It seems to be impossible for the promoters and
directors of Finance and Joint-Stock Companies to

do anything in an open and intelligible way, except
pocket coin and. leave " stuff" to the defrauded
shareholders. The only case of punishment over-
taking any member of a body to whom Englaud

owes a commercial name that would Le offensive to

a Turk, and to whom Englishmen for it have paid

scores of millions squandered, was Mr. James
Freeling Wilkinson. By some slight of hand,
aided by au influential newspaper, he got out
of gaol—nobody knows why. VI ilkinson has
been in the habit of making hay while the
sun shone. lie made whole stacks during the
mania at an expense of two solid millions
of gold to the unfortunate shareholders of the
Joint Stock Discount Company. The management
was iniquitous, involving an awful amount of ruin,

but Mr. Wilkinson can think only of his own cast)
—there is no thought now of the horrors he spread
abroad while he lived at Brighton like a Pasha of
Many tails. No doubt the contrast between that
and a convict's cell came forcibly home, and we could
feel compassion for him were he not in our mind's
eye face to face with his crowd of victims. Among
the Parliamentary papers just issued is a petition to

the House of Commons from this gentleman pray-
ing for relief. He recounts his own early
history, which is doubtless very interesting,
but what is more to the point the history and pro-
gress of the company. He has been totally ruined

by the confinement and degradation, and so re-
duced in circumstances as to be dependent on the
casual aid of his family and strangers for the
means of subsistence ; he seems bitterly to regret
" that he is without any remedy against anybody
for compensation." Has Mr. Wilkinson the small
amount of imagination necessary to picture to him-
self a family ruined through his instrumentality
pleading in the same strain ? Does he suppose
that two millions of pounds sterling can thus be
lost without bringing awful suffering iu its train,
but he forsooth, the prime author of the catastrophe,
is alone to be heard appealing for national help•
Lord Romilly has ordered the liquidator to con-
tinue the action against Messrs. Capper, Escombet
and Lawson, to recovei the £4,000 ; and in it°
course further evidence may appear to exculpate
him, or to show the substantial justice of his sen-
tence. In, the former case he will be entitled to
compensation, for in whatever light his doings may
be regarded he will have been innocent of the pa"
titular crime for which he has been punished, and
such an end will be in keeping with the whole
course of the commercial crash.

--
The Credit Foncier of England held its meeting,'
and as usual there was much talk and little action.
It appears to usas a rule that the great ,st asses among
the shareholders are those most ready to speak, and to
our mind it accounts for the loud braying when Os
donkeys come together. It may be taken as prima
facie evidence that a man is an ass to be in such 6
company, but we have all our little weaknesses, and
high dividends make a wisp which will coax mall
a donkey along, and one we confess, if not
with
shame, at least with sorrow, to have led us on itt 3
sharp trot. But to return to our subject. rrhe
chairman, a newly-elected director, who took Ine
seat with clean hands, was able to talk plainly, having
nothing to conceal. Ile showed the nature of the
transactions, and the motives that influenced the di-
rectors. He strongly condemned awarding comtniP
sions to the managers in proportion to success, as th°
temptation thus held out was too strong for human
nature. When this century commenced a starving
child who stole a loaf was hanged, and that iv°
the fate of a mother who purloined a piece of Wet
to keep her children alive. But it appears that 3
body of directors, one a right honourable and sotne
of them legislators, are to stand excused for trans
actions with the funds of others they would ha
turned from if dealing with their own money, be;
cause the commission offered was enormous, and
a portion of it went into their own Pocke
therefore beyond human resistance. In plain 10'
gunge they were bribed. "Nor was the transactieri
confined simply to this. Had they taken desperate
hazards, and made a fair division of the plunder""
although they could not be excused as men of bus ;
ness—the affairs would not have had their 1171
questionable character. But they left the "
to those whose money they squandered, u", 4
took the coin themselves. They swallowed
oyster, and, with a great parade, a 614°1;
of bells and sounding of gongs, with e
flare of gas, and a display of plated ware, the(g
handed the shells to the company. But even thm
al'
unsatisfactory banquet has of late been denied t,„
poor shareholders, and the principal performer e,
seated himself from the last meeting. Nothing re,
mained for his capacious maw—the oysters svell'o
all gone and the shells were there in a heap--senc
retired, leaving the new man to tell the conWe.,7,/
what was in them. The patient and long-endure:fg
animal appears to have been pressed too far, for its ev'ee
are back, itlooks vicious and seems inclined to wiling
but whether a little (director) patting and tick
en,
may not mollify the beast remains to be seen
Messrs. D. and S. Woolf, 17, King-street, Chesl;
side, announce a meeting of those shareholders 'e
sirous to investigate the affairs of the cornP,3%i
when we suppose they will follow the exam P 1
their French prototype, in at least so far as to in
,
the directors refund the sums to which they heiria
themselves as commission on profits never, do
truth earned. Some day or another we wil'ho
our best to explain the work, for doing
Ns'f
Albert Grant, Esq., M.P., received a salad,
£3,000 a year, and over £72,000 in conatnisOde,
why he was smiled on by foreign princes, an 3 tat
corated by kings. If the shareholders who inceal
the call of the Messrs. Woolf (Wolf !)—by the Woo,
an ominous name for the " lamb" Grant—are::the
tent to accept the chairman's explanations Oa tb,
poor directors were tempted beyond their strengt it,
and there to let the matter rest—we will regret do
Not that we care whether these gentlemen du °^aiti
not retain all they got, but because the days win °goo
come when other directors will be sorely tempted' 0611
the example of the Credit Foncier will not in scow
a case strengthen their resistance. Success OA tba
rages—and punishment deters ; and we regar'lnte•
action of the shareholders as having a publie2.t
rest simply from this stand-point. The crime, if
one, lies in the misrepresentation which mat-Walt
the early reports of the company, and did marked
the
to demoralize the investing public. It led conv
dreds on to ruin who never held a share in the joi,
pany, and produced even more unscrupulous „tor 3
tutors. We doubt not that many of the dire_v cot
were themselves deceived, although the staewc3oo
of the chairman is against this. But let hebod
be fairly tried, and if it appears that they as ,3 tbeif
acted in a
_bona fide way for the interests 01 •atO
employers and of the shoals whom they enticearto
the numerous undertakings they floated and Tod
—then let them keep their commission, 11 bn
their work has ended so disastrously toe'
themselves.