Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1891-01-16
Those Collapsed so.,h.rn H..m,.

We ventured to state last spring that
great city, with valuable corner lots. en-
terprising manufactures and developed
business could not be built up in 10 davs
from a corn field or a cotton plantation.
We ventured to assert that something more
than flaming prospectus a vestibule train.
SPECTATORS promise, was necessary to
convert lO-dollaT bill invested in March
into lOO-dollar bill to he harvested in De
cember We ventured 10 state that in the
| North or East or Middle states it required
| years of labor and millions of capital, and
vast expenditure of brain and energy. to
build city. We ventured to state that such
city as was painted in the newspaper ad-
vertisements of last spring. and in the ele-
giant books published by enterprisng spec
ulators, concerning their respective towns
and villages could not he erected in few
short months, and that all who based their
calculations upon such mushroom growth
must meet disappointment and loss
We did not think at that time. however,
that the promoters of these schemes would
allow the wind to escape from their bal
looms in few short months We thought
they would at least spend part of their
profits in maintaining the integrity of their
promises at least one year. We thought
the slide down hill Of the innocent invest
ors of the North would be made easy bv
the oil of promise aud the lubricant of full
fiment We did not think that the first
dividend of one Of the most promising of
the companies would be request to furnish
- per share, or lose the whole investment
IN bankruptcy on the receivers hands We
did not think the crash would be so sudden.
so severe or so harsh. The harmonious
music of the reed band of last spring has
] 1pOpnaTafad ba r.
Chinese gongs. The pleasant dreams of
wealth and prosperity and development
pictured in the happy investors mind last
spring becomes scene of desolation, of
bankruptcy and disappointment in the early
winter, Just at the season when the south
ern enterprise should take On its greatest
glory, after the early !rosts have killed the
malaria A most sudden and violent smash
ing of the idol has occurred.
We would not for a moment disparage
the preeminent resources of the great
South. We do not believe the spectators
have carried away much of the iron or
coal or cypress or marble, neither do we
believe they ever intended to do much hard
work in that vicinity. We regret that so
valuable section, blessed with such nat
ural resources, should fall into the hands of
sheer spectators, who rest satisfied with a
paper city, without that development which
the investing public of the North had
right to expect, That the South will
emerge from this scene of bankruptcy and
disappointment in its unnaturally inflated
development companies we have no reason
to doubt, but the same principles which
build city in the North, or the East, or
the West, must be adopted in the South
and Southwest. A vacant field cannot be
converted into city of 100, 00O population
in the lifetime of a mosquito Permanent
development, actual solid growth, require
at least the lifetime of a generation, and
he who expects to do in 60 or 30 days that
which took wiser and better men 60 and 30
years to do, must either have the conceit
which will end in his ruin, or the ignorance
which will lead to his bankruptcy. y.-4meri.
cda CuhirdtOr.