Year: 1867




No nicknames, "Clove' and "Mouse;'
No omerry frolics after TED


No baby in the house.





THE NEW YORK GOLD ROOM.


From graphic description of the gold room il
New York, In the Chicago Tribune, we select a teN
passages:


THE GOLD ROOM CURIOSITY.


In little court room surrounded by four walls
and closed in with roof, having circuitous pas.
sage-way from Broad-street, may be witnessed, al
any hour of the day, and six days in the week, q
scene which has not its likeness in earth or heaven
Whether its parallel can be found in h, will
not undertake to say. Perhaps it can, but this
much I consider certain, that the New York Gold
Room is, to-day the greatest curiosity in the world


Imagine rat-pit In full blast, with twenty OF
thirty men ranged around the rat tragedy, each
with canine under his arm, all yelling and howl.
ing at once, and you have as good comparison as
can ba found in the outside world, of the aspect Of
the gold room 1t strikes the beholder on his first
entrance The furniture of the room Is extreme
ly simple. It consists Of two iron ratings and an
four feet high and ten feet in diameter, placed OK,
which represents the space devoted to ratkilng in
similar establishments, is marble Cupid throwing
up a Jet Of pure Croton.


''LAME DUCKS"


The other railing Is semicircle twenty or thirty
off the 'lame ducks and dead BEATS men who
have once been famous at the rat phi" but have
since been Cleaned out" Being unable to settle
their differences, they are not allowed to come
inside. Sovency is the first essential of the gold
ROOM Nothing bogus is allowed to interfere with
the serious business in hand. Nevertheless, these
''lame ducks and dead beats cannot keep away
from the place, Day after day they come and range
themselves along the iron grating and look over
at the rat pit with the strangest expression intel
gent vacancy and longing despair that can be found
this side Of purgatory. They seem to be part Of
the furniture Of the ROOM While was there, /
did not see one Of them move or speak, and when
they winked it was with much the same spirit that
hoists it again.


THE INDICATOR


The indicator" which is the third piece of fur.
niture in the room, Tor the fourth, if we count the
''dead beats, y is apiece Of mechanism to show the
fashioned New England clock, seven or eight feet
high, with an open space at the top, disclosing
three figures and fraction, as 14l4, at which the
market stood when entered. The figures being
movable slight manipulation will manifest any
change in the market Connected with the indi-
Gator is plain DESK with book on it, in which are
recorded all the movements of the indicator, with
the hour and minute at which each movement takes
place. The floor of the establishment is rather a
pavement, with circular steps terraces rising from
the centre to the circumference. Meat, but, not
gaudy," is the general aspect of the premises. OF
course, such an institution could not exist without
4o1o "a, ~, G,,J
muncating with the gold room by row ofwindows,
through which dispatches are constantly passing.


THE SHOUTING.


Having given the external appearance of the
concern, we now come to the business. Three
and pencils. Wow-wow- wow -wow-wow, yah-yah-
yah-yah-yah, from twenty or thirty throats around
the pit, all at once, and kept going from morning
till night, from Monday till Saturday, is what pre-
sents itself to the ear of the beholder The voices
of the gentry around the circle are for the most part
teao,9, with now and then .talsettO and basso.-
shall not soon forget baSso Trofdo in the ring,
who drew his breath at regular intervals, and an
nounced his desires with seriousness truly remark
able. He was thick-set man, with capacious
chest shaggy head, keen eyes and rusty whiskers,
which curved upward from his inferior maximil-
larry bone in the most determined manner. He
cooked his head on one side thrust his chin as far
over the railing as possible, and made himself heard
every time. He put in his B fiat in regular caden-
ces like the trombone performer in miD-pond of a
summer evening, drowning for the moment all the
fddles in the frog community, or like the double
bass crashes in the overture ofTannahauser which,
by the way, might pass for "Gold Room Potpourri''
without the alteration of single note.


BUSINESS.


Among the faces constantly swinging around the
circle there is marked preponderance of Israel
ties. But they do not, by any means, mo-
nopolize the business. There are young Yankees
here, apparently not more than twenty-one years of
age, with downy cheeks and shrewd eyes, wow-wow-
ing and yaw-yawing at each other across the rail
ing, and whisking their pencils with photographic
velocity. You see no smiles in this ring. Many
of the operators are smoking but they have no time
for conundrums Commencing betimes in the
morning, they must buy and sell gold enough be-
fore night to pay for Chicago twice over. Putting
the purchases and sales together, they will not un
frequently amount to one hundred millions of dol
lars In few cases only is the gold actually deliv-
cred. Balances are settled with gold certfcates-
day is by giving checks man drawing check
for each purchase, or receiving one for each sale.


But what does it all amount to2 had almost
said that the godroom regulates all the prices in the
United States 1t does not regulate, but it records
them. The gold room is itselfregulated by the out
side world. Each movement of the indicator" is
the resultant Of all the forces at work in America
Europe, Asia and Australia, which can possibly af
feet the value of United States bonds. 1t follows
that the operators in the gold room should be-
at the same time the best informed and the most
intelligent business men of the country They must
not only have the best and latest information, but
they must be able to determine instantly, what is
the effect of any given fact which may come to their
knowledge They must be able to resolve the most
complicated problems in mental arithmetic without
moments hesitation.


Now and then the price will run up wildly, upon
given state offaets and run down again as rapidly
when it is discovered that the facts are not having
the effect which was generally expected by the op-
orators They are pretty cool and accurate in their
calculations, but the atmosphere Of the gold room
almost inevitably perverts mans judgment, and
brings him to grief in the long run.


CONCLUSION.


The stock board is provided with moderator
and two reporters thus having the semblance OF
parliamentary law for its government. The gold
board has nothing Of the kind. 1t is ceaseless
iangle whirlpool of voices without order without
umpire referee or stakeholder. Yet as it spins on,
millions upon millions are bought and sold the pri-
ces Of all goods, wares, merchandise, produce,
bonds, stocks and property generally, throughout
the country are marked up or down, obedlently to
the inexorable ''indicator" in the gold room. How
these men can understand each other, and avoid
making mistakes, is mystery.


Now and then the noise flags and almost ceases
While was there, it ceased tor moment entire
ly. The smokers placidly pufed their blue wreaths
upwards, and the murmur of little fountains became
l.Il l.nl Lac