St. Paul daily globe., 1894-07-15
ODDS AND ENDS.

"There is an infection in these
'booms' just as there is in other dis
eases OF the body. Financial crazes are
to the minds of men what microbes of
cholera are TO mems bodies." said one
of party of gentlemen who were dis
cussing the depression and its causes.
Some years ago." lie continued, 81
went to one of our Western villages IN
which the fever was raging OH the in
yitation of friend there to come and
go in with him. l took my coo judg-
ment with me and spent week there.
saw village of packing-bOx houses
scattered over prairie which stretched
from the town to nowhere. on which
here and there at wide and lonesome
distances were settlers cabins. L saw
10 vision of great city looming up in
the future and all l could see was
possibility of comfortable, prosper
Gus country when the prairies were
all under plow. But after the third
day of listening to the talk which was
all OF rise of values, sales of
lots at surprising advances. pIctu res of
the future, and SO OH, being in the thick
fsuch spirit, could feel as sensibly
as one feels the throb of the fever in
his veins, the contagion of the boom
working in my mind, and felt sure that
ii staid long l would become victim.
L got away as soon as | could" Said
another one OF the gro up: "I had
the disease, and had it bad, and as
look back on it now | wonder how it all
happened that my judgment was so
completely swept off its feet. 1t was, as
you say, an Infection; it was worse, it
was a craze. And it caught not only
the men with the speculative or gam
bling spirit in them. but men of sober
Judgment and conservative views, who
invested the money they had accumu-
lated by dlnt of frugality, economy and
hard work in the gauZiest of schemes.
L near men Sigh for return of the
good times. but earnestly pray that we
may never again see those good times.
A man might as we'll wish return
OF the typhoid fever" Here"
added another of the party, ''in the
morning paper is sad commentary on
what you have been talking about A
paragraph tells in a morning paper of
the death in the city hospital of George
ID. Orme and his interment at the pub
lie cost. l knew Orme well, and those
who frequented the Merchants much
during the past several years. if the
did not get acquainted with him, will
remember the gray-haired, ruddy- faced,
English looking man, who was in the
lobby day after day. He was a man of
large business experience, with the
Souudest of business. trade and finan-
clal views. He had the Englishman's
sturdy common sense and conservatism.
He had amaSSed a comfortable fortune
IN trade, and came here some years ago
during the boom, or about as II was
swelling to its crest, with his wife, bring
ing with him his fortune, some sl75 900,
lured by the stories of rapid fortune
making in real estate investments
which had crossed the ocean. He, too,
took the contagion and invested every
dollar in dirt, don't know just where,
but when the boom broke it left him
with lot OF utterly unstable dirt On
his hands. His wife could not stand our
climate and returned to England, but
he staid here to watch his investments
and wait with dogged patience for the
return Of the boom. His funds ran out,
and when rheumatism attacked him he
was removed to the city hospital for
treatment, being himself unable to paw
for his care. He partially recovered, but
Brights disease followed, and he is now
dead, as dead as his investments, as
dead as the boom that ruined him. and
sleeps i'll the city's burial place l don't
know anything sadder; it is one of the
many thousand tragedies of the boom.
L, too, say heaven preserve US from a
recurrence of such good times.'"
p. J, S.