This, I need scarcely say, has at present not only eaten up every
halfpenny of cover, but a great deal besides; and I am not sure that I
shall not have to come down on my clients to make good the balance. I
cannot account for the result, except from the fact that a new clerk
read out the wrong tape; and when I telephoned to my West-End Private
Inquiry Agent about these very three Stocks, he appears not to have
heard me distinctly, and thought I was asking him about Goschens, the
old Three-per-Cents., and Bank Stock, about which, of course, he could
only report favourably. It is an awkward mistake, but, as I point out
to all my clients, one must not regard the Dealer as infallible. These
things will occur. However, I am going to be more careful in future;
and I may as well announce now, that on Monday next I am about to open
a new Syndicate Combination Pool, with a Stock about which I have made
the most thorough and exhaustive inquiries, with the result that I
am convinced an enormous fortune will be at the command of anyone who
will entrust me with a sufficiently large cheque in the shape of cover
to enable me to realise it.
For obvious reasons I keep the name of this Stock at present a dead
secret. Suffice it to say, that the operation in question is connected
with an old South-American Gold Mine, about to be reworked under the
auspices of a new company who have bought it for a mere song. When I
tell my clients that I have got all my information from the Chairman,
_who took down under his greatcoat a carpet-bag full of crushed quartz
carefully mixed with five ounces of gold nuggets_, and emptied this
out at the bottom of a disused shaft, and then got a Yankee engineer
to report the discovery of ore in "lumps as big as your fist," and
state this in the new prospectus, they will at once see what a solid
foundation I have for this new venture, which must inevitably fly
upwards by leaps and bounds as soon as the shares are placed upon the
market. Of course, when the truth comes out, there will be a reaction,
but my clients may trust me to be on the look-out for that, and, after
floating with all their investments to the top of the tide, to get
out of the concern with enormous profits before the bubble eventually
bursts. It is by a command of information of this kind that I hope to
ensure the confidence and merit the support of my friends and patrons.
Remember Monday next, and bear in mind a cheque for three-and-sixpence
covers £5000. The subjoined is from my correspondence:--
Sir,--I have as trustee for five orphan nieces to invest for each
of them £3 18s. 9d., left them by a deceased maternal cousin. How
ought I to invest this to the greatest advantage with a due regard
to security. What do you say to Goschens? Or would you recommend Rio
Diavolos Galvanics? These promise a dividend of 70 per cent., and
although they have not paid one for some time, are a particularly
cheap stock at the present market price, the scrip of the Five per
Cent. Debenture Stock being purchased by a local butterman at seven
pounds for a halfpenny. A Spanish Nobleman who holds some of this,
will let me have it even cheaper. What would you advise me to do?
Yours, &c. A TRUSTEE IN A FOG.
Don't touch Goschens, they are not a speculative Stock. You certainly
might do worse than the Rio Diavolos Galvanics. Do not hesitate, but
put the little all of your five orphan nieces into them at once, and
_wait for the rise_.
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