Cleveland morning leader. [volume] (Cleveland [Ohio]) 1854-1865, 1864-03-24

what is made out Of their information.
Some are promised q fixed share Of the
profits; others are simply "lst in, as the
phrase goes, for fifty or q hundred thou
sand dollars, in any extensive operation
based on the news they furnish.
Thus-the news comes Of q great disas-
ter. 1t will shock public confidence, and
send gold up two, three, five, even ten per
cent. One Of these correspondents Of
great New York stOck.operating house
gets it few hours before it becomes pub
lie. He instantly prepares some previous
ly agreed upon dispatch" Mary is much
worse, and the doctor gives the case up;"
or Johnis very i'll and will not be able to
travel for some days yet and telegraphs
this innocent looking message, not to the
firm in New York, for that would srouss
suspicion, if there were censor ct the
telegraph Office, but to the private address
Of some one Of its members, or to the conf
Dental clerk, or even, in some cases, to
the wife Of some one OF the house. They
begin buying gold at once, cautiously and
through as many third 7 arties as possible,
to avoid creating panic; and, among
their other purchases, make ore Of fifty
or hundred thousand for the man who
has furnished the news.
Next day, or perhaps within a few
hours, the news gets out and gold goes
up, say five per cent If the correspond
ent has been +" let in" for hundred thou
sand, he pockets five thousand dollars as
his share Of the operation.
Occasionally one of these correspond
ents mskes such q lucky strike-much
more often he furnishes news for weeks
and months without It's having such sn eff
feet on the market as to bring him more
than the merest driblets Of profits. But
the chance Of something brilliant" has
its fscinstions, and the stock operators
have no difficulty in inducing we'll inform
ed people to furnish them all the news
they get.
These men haunt every lobby and COM
mitHaa sFoon1s-=-t 7sor,ssrsssssT ooazz1siee4ss,
reaches oonolusion on some important
question, affecting gold or stocks, or whis.
Ky, or any other article Of speculation. |
They imagine it 8 profound secret and are
startled, day or two sfterwara, to find !
that some operator in New York had it |
within few hours after its adoption, and |
that fortune has been made out Of the |
intelligence. The Supreme Court makes q |
deoiHon-befors it is pronounced, 'ring" |
in New York has operated on it's effect, /
and made enough to set every one connect
ed with it up in the world A bureau Of |
the government resolves to recommend q
tax on g particular srticle-before the
recommendation resches Congress- certain
parties in New York have bought up all
of the article they can get and when the
rise cOmes they pocket the proceeds.
1t seems utterly impossible to prevent
this. When the news Of important battles
is coming in, Government has sometimes
attempted it, but the attempt was IS IDLE
as it was foolish. A censor has been es.
tablished at the telegraph office and he has
wisely suppressed every dispatch saying
word about the var. But q servant girl
comes in with hurried scFsWl en- torn
sheet Of delicately scented paper, in 8
lsdy's hand:
"George +. Montgomery, Fifth Avenue
Hotel, New York. Do come home at once.
Mary cannot live twenty-four hours long
er. Laura Montgomery"
How can he stop thst2 But "Georee
&. Montgomery" is myth, and Mary's
illness means Hooker's dsfest end the ho-
tel clerk has been instructed to send any
such dispatch by the spsediest means to
bank down town; end the
firm makes the money, and the Govern
ment censor keeps blinking like an owl ,
over the dispatches, and rigidly stopping |
g everything relating to the war" and
Mr.. StsuntOn facilities himself over hsV-
ng made those newspaper pests send
heir accounts by mail rather than bv ,
How little sense it takes to
'un a Government" said some wise mani
Once, during last summer, leading
newspaper editor got disgusted, and de-
ermined that the gold grumblers should
lot monopOlize all the early news. So he ,
vent into the cipher business too, but be- =
ng rather raw at it, his first effort was a
lot quite so good as some subsequent ones. \
lie forwarded the cipher to his leading 3
Washington correspondent. Pretty soon I
he operators in this city, who knew him
olely as devoted newspaper man, were n
'stonished at receiving for him this dis 3
,stoh from Washington: Q
Have sold for you fifteen thousand Q
'ushels Of corn at 35. The market looks a
quslly" n
His paper announced, the next morning, s.
hat the main body of Lees army had >,
rossed the Maryland line, and was NOV :
ng into Pennsy ylvsnis; and his chief ri =
81 got very mad and complained to the i
Var Department that he was bribinR the Il
company; bat it was whispered
bout among his friends that 80 and so Il
Tss neglecting his business and going into
cry rash speculstiOns, and - he chang.
d his cipher
But l am wandering from the speculs- :
ions over the Gold bill, which set out to 4
eseribe. The happy people who know
othing about the gold market may not
now that money may be made on fall
gold or stocks ssWell as on 8 rise. Sup
ose you know that something, not now
ublic, is going to transpire in a dsy or
NO that will put gold down. You Hsell
hort that is 10 say, you get q contract
nth man who wants gold to furnish
i'm 80 many thousand, at the present price. n
ehversble in three or four DAYS. or At
ThsteVer time agreed upon, when YOU feel
srtsin that gold will lower. Say gold il 4
ow 100. Three days hence, on the I
.rength Of this news you have had an ad.
ance il falls to 1855. You buy in what
yer amount you have sgreed to deliver At
So, and you collect for it, according to =
,ntract, $50. In other words You make
Vs per cent.
Il was proposed to give the Secretary Of :
le Treasury power to sell gold whenever
J Hanted-thAt Is. to thrnE tha rauar n