The St. Charles herald. [volume] (Hahnville, La.) 1873-1993, 1884-07-19
THE NEW YORK STOCK EXCHANGE.

THE NEW YORK STOCK EXCHANGE.
If you should see, for the first time,
the brokers in the New York Stock Ex-
change FOUNDED near the close of the
last century,, as you may easily do, by
stepping up a single flight of stairs from
Wall street into either of the two gal
leries, you would be excusable for be-
lieving yourself in mad-house.
The great room, or hall, about one
hundred by forty feet, with walls and
lofty ceiling handsomely frescoed and
decorated, does not look in the least
like lunatic asylum; but the crowd of
men on the marble floor below you can
certainly act like maniacs. There are
hundreds of them, all very nicely and
fashionably dressed, shouting, gesticu-
lating, moving rapidly, nervously about,
most Of them with pencils or stylographic
pens and small books in their hands,
dashing down something every few sec
onds, and then lifting their. arms and
voices again, as if to add to the general
confusion and uproar. Not word, al
though they scream, is Ineligible to
you OF to anybody else IN the galleries;
you could hardly be persuaded that they
are bawling except for the sake of bawl-
ing. If they really wish to be under
stood, they must either be using a Ian
guage you are unacquainted with, or
talking a kind of gibberish peculiar to
the Exchange. Can they be serious or
sane? They are very serious, and they
think themselves the sanest of the sane.
They are doing their regular business,
buying and selling stocks. They are
Bulls and Bears; the Bulls being those
trying to put up prices, and the Bears
those trying to pull prices down.
What sounds in the gallery so mean
ingless to you, and to every outsider, is
perfectly clear to the men on the floor.
They are calling out: One hundred New
York Central; Three hundred Burling-
ton & Quincy; Two hundred Michigan
Southern; One thousand Western IN
ion; Seven hundred Northern Pacific
Preferred, or Ten thousand United
States Currency skies.
When a broker wishes to buy or sell,
he lifts his arm, to attract attention,
and names the kind and amount of Sc
curity. Bids are made by shouts; when
any one of these is accepted, the broker
mods in certain way, and the matter
is settled. The buyer makes rapid
memorandum of the transaction; the
seller does the same, and the security,
whatever it may be, is delivered either
at the close of bank hours, or at the
time agreed upon.
From the beginning to the end of the
year, all transactions are conducted in
this manner. Hundreds of millions of
Il 81 81, hov l,
than gesture, shout and nod. You
would suppose that mistakes must con-
stantly be made. But this scarcely
ever happens. The brokers are used to
the din, and practice has made them
perfect in the difficult art of doing bust
dess in the midst of apparent chaos.
The Exchange has membership of
eleven hundred, about six hundred
members being active. The rest are
either old or elderly men who keep their
seats Git is styled seat, probably, be-
cause broker very seldom sits down,
though partly retired, or men of ample
means who live or are travelling abroad.
The active members are mostly young
or youngish, very few of them being
beyond middle age. They certainly be-
have like big boys just released from
school, so full are they of frolic and fun.
Dignity and repcse is the last and least
thing they care for or esteem. Indeed,
they are opposed to anything like the
assumption of either. Often when some
distinguished stranger is introduced
upon the floor they ridicule him, and
play Jokes at his expense, even fasten-
ing papers with derisive phrases to his
coat-tails, or hustling him rudely, or
knocking his hat over his eyes. And
the more distinguished a stranger is, the
more boisterous and impertinent they
are apt to be.
Their sportiyeness is particularly
shown at Christmas time, when hun
dreds of the brokers, some of them fifty
years old and more, appear on the floor
blowing whistles and tin trumpets,
winding rattles and beating toy drums
often presents for their children-af-
ter the manner of street urchins. As
very little is done, usually, during the
y &leys, they can give themselves ex-
-rra0f 7ery license, and so, perhaps, re-
lieve tn minds from the strain they
are usual, under while on the Board.
The scenes there at Christmas-tide are
curious to witness. Nowhere else in
civilization, it may be safely asserted,
do solid men of business, a good proper
ton of them millionaires, behave so
ridiculously.
Another day of amiable riot is what
they style White Hat Day-in early Sep
tember-when they call in, as they put
it, the white hats. The summer having
then fairly passed, they show their
knowledge and appreciation of the fact
by knocking off and trampling on every
white hat worn by any of their brother
brokers at that date. No white hat is
seen there then but comes to immediate