Morning journal and courier., 1881-10-04
Price Four Cents.

collected votes and have decided to stop their mills for 8 fortnight altogether and then work half-time. They think that suspension of business, by limiting demands, will com pei the go-oetweens, who must have money to sell at a reductions calculation drawn
 too fine, particularly with all this warning but even If they succeed, the misery inflicted on hundreds of thousands will be great enough perceptibly to affect the prosperity of the year. Lancashire will be sEclemmed"
 for fortnight as by universal strike, in or der that twenty men may become rich at
 stroke. Even that is nothing compared with
 the 'corner" that exists in corn and espe-
 cially the ''corner'' that might exist It is
 known that spectators in America are
 holding back corn by enormous choked, the warehouses bursting.
 freight difficulty, and the price some shil- ilngs quarter above the level that would
 otherwise prevail That combination may fail, because English agriculturalists have
 been over-pessimist about their crop and the
 regraters may have to wait longer than their resources will stand but next year they will come into the market with larger sypdi
 cate, better information and heavier re- sources, and there is no saying what they
 could not do. England never has more than
 half enough bread, and France is often a
 tenth short and In bad year we see no rea-
 son why ring commanding ten millions
 of credit at per cent should not
 buy all corn to arrive" for four months,
 run up prices 20 shillings 8 quarter and
 make two millions sterling. The world could not pour it's surplus to the center of aaeFsn ID time, for it could not arrange transport and freight without three months
 warning. Indeed we are inclined to believe
 that by long bargains bolder things than this
 might be done, and are afraid to say what. in
 our belief, are the limits of the possible,
 mere are articles like coal, corn and salt in
 which an interruptions ring, with really
 great means, by buying ''futures'' might se-
 riously affect the happiness and eyen the
 safety of nations. Suppose it held the flour
 of London only for one week. There is
 hardly limit to the credit and the funds procurable when profit can be shown on pa- per to be certain; the supply, even of corn, is fixed quantity; it can always be sold. if the speculation fails, at cost price; and as for regraters relenting, they would starve the human race to make a million. The writer once, by an accident had the means of personally remon strating with syndicate which attempted much more risky operation" than even that the cotton ring is trying. They had deter mined to deprive Bengal of salt, and they suc- ceeded-it was before the time of cables-in getting hold of the amount available for four months. So complete was their success in their purchases and contracts that, fortun- ately for British rule, it turned their heads with greed. They quadrupled the price in week, and the government, foreseeing uni versal popular insurrection, took step to be justified only by extreme fear for public safety, and though themselves the manufac- turers, practically broke faith with their own customers, by publicly notifying that if the plot were not abandoned they would sell their own reserves of salt at cost price, Not one of the group engaged could be made to see that he was personally responsible for all the misery that might arrive, or could sup press his delight at such chance of making g heavy fortune suddenly. It was all '1e- gitimate business"