The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1882-11-11

| strange lull in the speculative wind
which has until recently been rampant
and apparently smitten every English
man who had any money to invest. The
mining market and the electric-lighting
market have been equally dull, and the
public, which recently rushed blindfOld
into undertakings to win domestic tin
and copper, or foreign gold and silver,
is now awakening to that fact that the
golden hopes held out by the promoters
of these enterprises will fail to be real
lied. The experience of British invest
ors has lately been most unfortunate.
For every mining enterprise that has sue
ceeded a score have proved lamentable
failures. and millions of funds have been
literally thrown away upon undertakings
which any ordinarily sane man might
have known could never succeed. Dur
ing the past few years a few successes
may be chronicled; but for every erich
mOnd'' there have been dozen EN-
mas" and for every Cape copper mine
| twenty "Rubies;" and other conspicuous
failures may be chroncled.
The Indian gold mining rage of two
years ago is a remarkable instance of the
gullibility of the British investing
/ public, and the tendency of men to fol-
low each other as sheep follow a bell
| wether. The bell-wethers, by the wav,
usually take good care to clear out at
profit and leave their hapless following
! to its fate.
Although, while the ''rage" lasted,
nearly all the Indian mining companies
shares went to a high premium, they are
] IA,
considerable discount while many are
unstable at any price. An attempt was
lately made to galvanize the Indian
mining market into activity, but the
effort has utterly failed. 1t was an
from one of the Indian mines had been
asSayed and showed results equivalent
to twenty ounces per ton; but this news,
which q year ago would have added
thirty per cent. to the value of the shares,
has scarcely caused them to move.
About fifteen months ago memorable
| telegram announced that the q" Indian
Gold Mines Company of Glasgow had
crushed twenty tons of quartz, the first
two yielding four ounces of gold per ton.
Since then numerous discoveries of Won
! derful reefs all over the country have
been reported, yet the market remains
| sluggish. OF the thirty-Seven companies
formed to work Indian gold mines not a
single one has paid dividend from actu-
al working, although one or two have
distributed money received for portions
of their property sold to other companies.
! About half-a-dOzen of the Indian min
! ing undertakings are now being wound
up; another half-dozen are on the brink
of liquidation, and the remainder are
either moribund or in a very low finan-
| cial position. Thousands of widows and
orphans have practically lost all they
! possess through investing in these mere
triciOus undertakings; and the cool OBJ
| server cannot but wonder at the faulty
of investors who have rushed into the
latest financial craze as the dupes of old
rushed into the g South-Sea Bubble"
| Quickly following the Indian gold-mn-
| ing rage has come furore for shares in
electric-lighting companies, many of
which had their capital subscribed ten
times over. 1t is q surprising fact that
there have been no fewer than forty-6ve
electric-light companies started in Lon
| don, with an aggregate authorized CAPT
|
that all of these companies cannot pay.
Great inventions are of slow growth.
Years elapse before the success of the
laboratory or workship becomes the ne
cessity of commerce. The mass of peo-
pie who regard Watt as the inventor of
| the steam engine forget that more than q
century before his birth a steam engine
was working in Great Britain. The dis
covery of any great invention is a very
small thing as regards the industrial arts
and commerce. Years of patient work
are generally requisite before it can take
place in practical life. As Brunei said:
at is one thing to invent, and another to
make the invention work" The invest
ing public here is apt to forget this
fundamental fact. Directly some great
scientific discovery is made, and a sue
cessful experimental demonstration
shown, people rush in to invest their
millions, and regular SauUe qui peut
ensues in the manufacture or industry
threatened by the new invention or dis
covery. Then comes some hitch, or
merely delay, in the bright hopes held
out, and the speculation pendulum
swings back A few far-sighted specu-
lators have made enormous fortunes,
while numbers of bona-iide investors
have lost all they possess.
That the electric light is the light of
the future, as the electric motor will be
the motor of the future, few unprecedented
minds can doubt; but it does not follow
that all the forty-fve electric light COM
panies will flourish. The general opin-
ion here is that the next year or two will
see a "war of selection" which will re-
suit in the survival of the fttest," and,
until the result of the warfare is seen,
cautious investors will fight shy of the
electric-light companies. There is no
question but that the best system of
electric lighting will be the one eventu-
ally adopted, and it is equally certain
that the half-hundred companies already
formed cannot all succeed. Like Indian
mining companies, none of the English
electric lighting companies have yet paid
a dividend from actual working. Several
assets have been distributed from money
received from the sale of subsidiary rights
to affiliated companies, but these are
golden eggs, of which the patent hen can
only lay a limited number. -PhtladeL-
lohia Bulletins, London Cor.
While recently staying in water 12s
boprs -, Do.t,,, ToNt,;,.