The Helena independent. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1875-1943, 1890-05-25
GULL|BLE BR|T|SHERS.
London the Paradise Of Schemers
Spectators and Promoters
of Shady Devices.
Worthless Things That Are Eager.
ly Snapped Up By Eng
lish Suckers.
Indian Gold Mn IS, Concess 0ns, Brewerie,
and Diamonds in Africa are Among
the Most Fancied.

Especial Correspondence of The 1NDEPENDENT.]
LONDON, May 1O.-London is the bank of
the world. OF that there can be no posi-
BILE doubt whatever. To the little village
on the banks of old Father Thames, schem-
ers, Spectators, and promoters flock from
every land. No matter how unlikely the
scheme is,or how large the amount of money
required to float it, to London it is brought,
an attempt at any rate is made to foist it
on the British public and make John Bull
unloose his purse strings. As rule John ID
easily chad" Talk about your Yam
kee Spectator and how he jumps at
100 to l chances! Why the Yankee is not in
the hunt with j. B., and would not touch
with a ten-foot pole some of the schemes
that are aoated every day in London. SO
much is this the case that it is often SAID
here that only those American schemes
brought over to London, and that anything
that is worth buying is never allowed to
leave the states. And that this is fact no
ono who knows anything of the shrewd
men in America with plenty o. capital DE-
hind them, who are always on the LOOKOUT
for anything good. will deny.
It is astonishing what utterly worthless
things do 90 down here and how eagerly
thew are snapped up. Nothing seems too
improbable for the investing public, and
let but good dividends be promised, and an
array of seemingly respectable names De
the British public will tumble over each
other in their desire to buy shares. 1t little
matters what the scheme is, whether to buy
a hole in the ground in South Africa,
a concession from some niger chief TO
"howk for diamonds or gold'' in some hith-
erto unknown land, or build q railway
from nowhere to nowhere in Central Amer
lea. it is pretty sure to find supporters
somewhere In England. I think it was Jay
Gould who once improved on Carlyle's say
ING about the population of England being
mostly fools by saying that of the sixty
millions popustg%n IN the w state1 that t woud
be true in England, only moro so in pro-
portion to the population.
This craze for specializing in all kinds OF
rubbishy schemes, which some people seem
to think is a new phase of the English
character, and that it shows hitherto un-
known desire to become suddenly rich on
the part of the people, is really nothing
new. The same disease has been prevalent
in London for generations, and the present
race of fools are only the descendants OF
previous race. Look at the Mississippi
scheme and the South Sea bubble, the rush
for railroads in their early, days. and the
full institution was first started. One
would hardly speculate in life insurance
NOWADAYS, but when it was first introduced
a mans life was as favorite speculation
as mines are now. In those days, as IN the
present, nothing was too ridiculous Tor men
to take shares in, and there is on record the
fact that company was started with TO-
600 capital, in which the promoters prom
ised to pay 100 per cent dividend, but the
subscribers were not to know what the
money was required for or anything at all
about it. Five thousand pounds was
actually paid up, which, it is needless to
say, the Subscribers never saw again.
It is a case of one down the other come on
with schemes in London, and the disease
may be said to take the form of "manlas'
for particular securities %. Within, the
last ten or dozen years there have been +,
First of all we had the Indian gold fields in
the Mysore TERRITORY of India. This mania
started soon after the big failure of the
City of Glasgow bank. Certain firms in In
dia that had extensive dealings with the
bursted bank became bankrupt. They had
fell into the hands of several smart men
in London. Gold had been known in India
since the DAYS of Solomon, and Mysore was
honeycombed with worked-out gold mines.
That there was still some gold remaining
everybody who knew that part of the coun-
GEy WAS aware u, Dub WuetAcL ~ "ouAA WA
pay to work it was quite another matter.
There was quite sufficient gold-bearing
quartz. however, to make good samples, and
80 gold was once more discovered i'll the
Wynaad, specimens of the rich-bearinp
quartz sent home holes dug, and at onct
the Indian gold field craze set in. Now was
the time for the prospectus writer and the
company promoter to get in his tine work
Prospectuses of the most glowing descrip.
ton were written, picturing the land Of
Ophir, and proving conclnsively, that II
was to India Solomon sent his ships fol
gold. in the same way as the,
arch with having drawn his supplies from
South Africa. It was proved, too, that tn
natives of those days did not know how K
extract gold from quartz-they certainl!
didn't know how to extract 1t from thu
pocket of the public-and that with new
machinery, etcetera, etcetera, the amount o
gold to be got out of Mysore would hav
made the golden calf of the Israel
ties take back seat. What
rush there was for. gold min
shares! Every bankrupt lord or retire
colonel was hunted up to put their name
on the directorate of one or other OF tn
hundreds of mines that were either success
fully foated or were started and the
wound up the petition of some begulle
shareholder, who had got over his tit
temporary insanity and applied for share
in concern that was rotten on the face o
it. It is estimated that over one hundret
millions of dollars went to line the peck
cts of the promoters of these mines
nine-tenths of which were bogus
One or two paid for working ant
are working still, but the grea
majority were not worth the paper tht
shares were written on. That thousand
we're ruined and are ruined i'll every one o
these manias goes without saying; and tn
worst of it is that the majority of people ru
ined are those who can afford 1t least
What makes these schemes SO easy to doa
in England is the number of people-wld
ows, professional men. retired officers O
the army and navy-who have small ike
incomes, out of which by dint of plnchln
and scraping, they manage TO save icy
hundred pounds. They are not conten
with an investment that promises lo'
and therefore safe amount OF interest, S
they rush for the first plausible schem
that comes along promising them hlg
rate fer their money.
After the promoters had worked the My
sore gold craze for all that it was worth
and the mania had died out, they locke
round for some other bait to dangle befor
either the people who had anything left c
others who had come into their kingdoi
during the bursting of the previous bubble
The bait was soon found. Electric ligh
ing, although comparatively old with YOU
was new to us. "Limelight, as 1t WI
called, had been tried and was though
wonderful, but when the latest invention
of Edison and Brush were brought ov,
and successfully stood the practical te
they were put to, the promoter cried Eur
ka.' And at once the islands were floode
Nth vrocpeetuSes haiiinp the birth of III