The central Presbyterian. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1856-1908, 1885-10-14

spirit of gambling which has developed
so fearfully during the lifetime of the
present generation. We received a
letter recently from correspondent
who in perfect seriousness put to us
the question "whether it would be a
san for poor person with family to
invest a small amount in a Lottery
ticket ?"
We hardly think a Christian man
would have asked that question twenty
five years ago. 1t shows how times
have changed.
GAMBLING has been condemned as an
immoral thing by the voice of the civil
Used world, and now the question is
raised inside of the Church whether
there is any harm in it. Look at the
rallies in which church members are
often the most conspicuous actors. We
heard of fair or bazaar lately in a
Virginia town for a benevolent object,
where under the auspices of the ladies
the articles were mostly ratified off, and
on the last night of the fair, they actu-
ally sent to a faro bank, and borrowed
one of the tables there, and one of the
faro bank came over and ran the ma
chine for theml
The desire to get rich quick, and the
constant stock gambling that goes on
in all cities, is probably at the bottom
of the small betting and gambling that
goes on now in public places and in
private houses.
1t is interesting to follow the career
of these great stock gamblers, and see
how they end. The New York cor
respondent of the Baltimore Sun gives
the following history of some of the
leading men on the New York Stock
Exchange:
THE RECENT WALL-STREET FALUREs-A
STREET THAT LEADS TO x.
In the secretary Office of the Stock Exchange
hangs the portrait in oil of a man of marked
features. His arching forehead his large, firm
mouth, his prominent nose and fine eyes denote
man of great qualities. The portrait is that
of Jacob Little, the Jay Gould of his day and
generation. Once this man was the greatest
Spectator in America His transactions small
in comparison with those of modern operators
were looked upon as marvellous at that time
One day he was driving up town, and as he
passed Union Square he remarked to a friend
" ! have lost enough money to day to buy that
entire square" Little was the man who invent
ed short" sales and he it was that first resorted
to the expedlent afterwards copied by Gould, of
issuing bonds convertible into stock Of which he
was short, thus saving himself from being
squeezed. let this man of brains, fertile In re
sources, bold in execution. died comparatively
a poor man. and his name is simply memory
In the street where he was once the leading
power.
The failure of Henry N. Smith recalls the
fact that, like Jacob Little the great specua-
tors of Wall street. almost without an exception
are finally overthrown and cast into the sea of
disaster. Look at the long procession of col
lapses since Titles day. The gray boards in
the street can name over a score Of operators of
two or three decades ago who have gone into
bankruptcy, but the list is a sufficiently long
one even if limited to the records Of the past
ten years In 1872 eight Wal-street men gave
$4,000 apiece to relieve the sufferings of burnt
Chicago. The following year nearly every one
OF them was swept into bankruptcy by the pam
ic of 1873. Daniel Drew was one of the shrewd-
ooI VI w all sJIeoJ sp6CuldJOI5s Like george
Seney OF later day, he founded an institution of
learning. Both lost their wealth because they
made it in the whirlpool of Wall street. There
Is small man who is now a meek and incon-
spicuous member of the Stock Exchange. and
who Of late years has had hard work to make
both ends meet His name is A. B. Stockwell
Once he was a power in Wall street and presi-
dent of the Pacific Mail Steamship Company
Henry Willard, once the wonder of the specula-
tive world the u anipulator of the largest "blind
pool" ever formed, and president of the Pacific
Railroad whose lines have pierced the far dis
tant State where rolls the Oregon, now dwells
in retirement in Germany Men have already
begun to forget him. James r. Keene, the
dashing California operator, who for many years
was leader in Wall street and on the turf of
two continents. is now a bankrupt, struggling
hard to straighten his affairs. Fifteen years
ago Woodward was a prominent name in the
street. He failed, and is now almost forgotten.
Men formerly influential in the speculative
word now are inhabitants Of States prisons
like James D. Fish, or Of insane asylums, or,
like John c. Emo are fugitve5 from Justice in
Canada. Some like Gen. Joe Burnham lie in
suicides graves.
Henry N. Smith, who for twenty-five years
has had career in Wall street that rivals that
of Jay Gould in it, stirring incidents and dra-
matte episodes, at last IS cleaned out-a bank
rupt. Three weeks Of unfortunate speculations
swept away the wealth which the work Of %
years had created. There are few spectators
in the street who yetsurvive. They believe
that they are too strong, too sagacious to be led
captive into bankruptcy. but the history of spec.
ulation shows that sooner or later the stock