The San Francisco call., 1908-03-15

panic for today and political up
heaval for tomorrow as calmly as
though arranging a dinner party or
buying seats for the opera
Z Early in the book the heroine, who
is betrothed to the leader of Wall
street. is thrown from her horse and
rescued by a young attorney. who has
just been appointed to fill an unexpired
term as United States senator from
New York. And with this beginning.
what more could builder of fiction
desire? Mr.. Crozier gives us many
pages of economic essays which reveal
much insight into the game of swift
finance as played in Wall street.
In the opening chapter. which ante
dates the story about 80 years, the up
building of the plot is well outlined
Barney Bailey, a Cripple Creek capper,
overhears two Wall street men decry-
ing the various slow processes of alb
sorbing the wealth of the public. Bar
ney. with the amusing impertinence
of the man who has nothing to lose,
breaks into their conversation and in
vents on the spur of the moment the
game of high finance. and this is how
he expresses himself:
Frame up things folks are interest
ed in and think they know all about.
Advertise these things IN the papers.
Bait your hook with -em, and your
haul will beat that of a sucker net
dipped below the cam In the first
spring freshet- String together a lot
of railroads under some big name. then
list the stock, as you call it, Folks
are riding on the railroads and ship
ping over them. They kick about high
freights, so they'll want TO play even
by getting in on your side to rake in
part ofSthe dividends. Then bunch a
lot of factories that have been chasing
each other with scalping knives Show
EN- it'll pay better to stand together
and scalp the people. and you get a
good rakeoff for teaching these indus
tries to play the game. Then list their
combination in your machine. and get
them playing. You'll soon have all the
money, own the properties, and have
them ali running for your benefit
Whenever you discover new lot of
people with money. fisfc out what they
are most interested in, capitalize and
list 1t. print quotations so that they
can watch the fluctuations each day.
and It's dollars to doughnuts that their
wings Will be singed with the heat
from the hot boxes of your mill within
a month";"
Later on in this same opening chap
ter the idea of the present day all pow
erful merger Is given birth At a
ulnueI party, at Wnlch are Few con-
genial Wall street spirits. one member,
who is accused of being asleep, pro-
tests that he has only been dreaming
and when pressed to give his dream
says:
It's not copyrighted and 1 know
every man of you will steal it, once
let it loose, but it's this way: Every
time two railroads are hooked together
the capital stock can be doubled and
enough bonds sold to pay for both.
leaving the stock clear velvet When
these roads are combined with others
TO form a trunk line. that can be
milked again. Consolidating trunk
lines into a great railro7d system will
create new opportunities for obtaining,
without the investment 'of any money.
hundreds of millions of stock that will
soon be worth par because of the
country's growth. and the maintenance
of the high rates allowed in it's new
sections. Control of one system can
be obtained by anothef simply by using
the bond proceeds 70 acquire a ma
jority of the others capital stock. this
stock in turn to be pledged as collateral
for money to buy still other systems
This movement win all help create a
high market value for our stock. which
costs US nothing originally, and the