Chapter I: Preface

To gather the many remarkable incidents connected with the National Debt; to present an anecdotical sketch of the causes which necessitated, and the corruptions which increased it; to reproduce its principal characters; to detail the many evils of lotteries; to relate the difficulties in the early history of railways; to popularize those loans, of which the Poyais, with its melancholy tragedy, and the Greek, with its whimsical transactions, were such striking exemplars; and to group these subjects around the Stock Exchange, is the object of a portion of the present volume.

Any work which tends to familiarize the origin and progress of the National Debt, which shows that it was raised for no idle cause, and increased for no trifling purpose, may be useful in the consideration of that encumbrance which must, sooner or later, be reduced or repudiated.

The volume does not profess to be statistical,—there are abundant works of a financial kind upon the subject. Mr. Van Sommer’s valuable Tables, to which the writer acknowledges his obligations, and which, with Mr. Wilkinson’s Law of the Public Funds, should be possessed by every member of the Stock Exchange; the works of McCulloch, of Hamilton, of Grellier, of Fenn, render such a production unnecessary. The present volume is a popular narrative of the money power of England, intended to be at once interesting and suggestive.

_Shooter’s Hill._

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

PAGE

_Ancient Mode of supporting Governments.—Ignorance of Political
Economy.—Mercantile Greatness.—Early Supplies.—Tulip
Mania.—Accession of William._ 1

CHAPTER II.

_The Earliest National Debt.—History of Tontines.—Of the Money
Interest, its Origin, Extravagance, and Folly.—Royal Exchange.—First
Irredeemable Debt.—Tricks of the Brokers.—Jobbing in East India
Stock.—False Reports.—Importance of the English Funds.—Picture of
the Alley.—Systematic Jobbing of Sir Henry Furnese, Medina, and
Marlborough.—Thomas Guy, a Dealer in the Alley._ 6

CHAPTER III.

_Enormous Bribery by William.—Increased Taxation.—Speech of Sir
Charles Sedley.—Wrongs of the Soldiers.—Defence of William.—Moral
Disorganization of the Country.—First Exchequer-Bill Fraud.—First
Foreign Loan.—Romantic Fraud in 1715.—Political Fraud of ’Change
Alley.—Interference of the House of Peers.—First Hoax._ 12

CHAPTER IV.

_Charitable Corporation Fraud.—Its Discovery.—Appalling Effects
and Remedy.—Marlborough’s Victories, their History, and the Loans they
brought.—Augmented Importance of the Stock Exchange.—Dislike to the
Members.—Increased Loans.—Difficulties in procuring them.—Statement
of Sir Robert Walpole.—Gifts of Contractors to Clothiers.—First Payment
of Dividends by the Bank.—South-Sea Anecdotes._ 19

CHAPTER V.

_Life of Thomas Guy.—Imposition in Sailors’ Tickets.—Foreign Loan
attempted.—Sir John Barnard.—Expresses of the Jobbers.—Foreign
Commissions.—Origin of Time-Bargains.—Attempt to stop them.—Its
Inadequacy.—Proposal to reduce the Interest on the National
Debt.—Opposition of Sir Robert Walpole.—New Mode of raising
Loans.—Comparative Interest in Land and Funds.—Punishment of
Manasseh Lopez.—The first Reduction of Interest.—Life of Sir John
Barnard._ 25

CHAPTER VI.

_Origin of New Loans.—Fraud of a Stock-broker.—East India
Stock.—Sketch of Sampson Gideon, the great Jew Broker.—East India
Company.—Restriction of its Dividends.—Liberality to its
Clerks.—Important Decision.—Robbery at Jonathan’s.—Curious
Calculation concerning the National Debt._ 31

CHAPTER VII.

_Crisis of 1772.—Indian Adventurers, their Ostentation, their
Character.—Failure of Douglas, Heron, & Co.—Neale, Fordyce, &
Co.—Sketch of Mr. Fordyce.—His Success in the Alley.—Alarm of his
Partners.—His Artifice.—His Failure.—General Bankruptcy.—Liberality
of a Nabob.—Reply of a Quaker.—Witticism of John Wilkes.—War of
American Independence.—Artifices of Ministers.—Anecdote of Mr.
Atkinson.—Value of Life on the Stock Exchange.—Longevity of a
Stock-broker._ 39

CHAPTER VIII.

_Invention of Lotteries.—The First Lottery.—Employed by the
State.—Great Increase.—Eagerness to subscribe.—Evils of
Lotteries.—Suicide through them.—Superstition.—Insurances.—Spread of
Gambling.—Promises of Lotteries.—Humorous Episodes.—Legal
Interference.—Parliamentary Report.—Lottery Drawing.—Picture of
Morocco Men.—Their Great Evil.—Lottery Puffing.—Epitaph on a
Chancellor.—Abolition of Lotteries._ 45

CHAPTER IX.

_Wholesale Jobbing.—Insurance on Sick Men.—False
Intelligence.—Uselessness of Sir John Barnard’s Act.—Origin of the
Blackboard.—Opposition to Loans.—Lord Chatham’s Opinion of
Jobbers.—Inviolability of English Funds.—Parisian
Banking-Houses.—Proposition to pay off the National Debt.—Extravagance
of the Contractors.—Lord George Gordon’s Opinion of them.—Members’
Contracts.—New System adopted.—Abraham Goldsmid.—Bankers’ Coalition
broken by him.—His Munificence.—His Death.—Sensation in the
City._ 54

CHAPTER X.

_Curious Forgery.—Its Discovery.—Loan of 1796.—Its Management.—French
Revolution and its Effect.—List of Subsidies to Foreign
Powers.—Removal of Business from ’Change Alley.—Erection of the
present Stock Exchange.—Loyalty Loan.—Preliminaries of Peace.—Its
Effect.—Hoax on the Stock Exchange.—War renewed.—Great Fraud on the
Jobbers.—Its Discovery.—Rights of Stock-brokers._ 62

CHAPTER XI.

_Unfounded Charge.—Joint-Stock Companies.—Speculators.—Mark
Sprot.—Sketch of the House of Baring.—Policies on the Life of
Bonaparte.—Rumors of his Death.—David Ricardo.—Forgery of Benjamin
Walsh.—Excitement of the Nation.—Increase of the National
Debt.—Sinking Fund.—Unclaimed Dividends.—Francis Baily._ 72

CHAPTER XII.

_Review of the National Debt.—Opinions.—Bolingbroke.—Financial
Reform Association.—Extravagance of Government.—Schemes for paying
off the National Debt.—Review of them.—Proposals for
Debentures._ 82

CHAPTER XIII.

_Progress of Invention.—Public Roads.—Steam.—Duke of
Bridgewater.—Canals.—Railroads.—Thomas Gray, their Pioneer.—His
Difficulties.—Proposals for the Liverpool and Manchester
Railway.—Monopoly of the Canals.—Parliamentary Inquiry.—Extraordinary
Opinions of Witnesses.—The Claims of Thomas Gray.—Value of Canal
Property._ 89

CHAPTER XIV.

_Monetary Excitement.—Approaches to the Stock Exchange.—Gold
Company.—Equitable Loan Company.—Frauds in Companies.—Loan to Foreign
States.—Poyais Bubble._ 96

CHAPTER XV.

_Loan to Guatemala.—Dispute concerning it.—Greek Loan.—Its
Mismanagement.—Asserted Jobbing.—Mr. Hume.—Dr. Bowring.—Quarterly
Review.—Proposed Tax on Transfers._ 103

CHAPTER XVI.

_Sketch of the Life of Rothschild.—Comes to England.—Introduction of
Foreign Loans.—Large Purchases.—Anecdotes Concerning Rothschild.—His
Difficulties and Annoyances.—His Death and Burial.—Last Crisis on
the Stock Exchange._ 109

CHAPTER XVII.

_Legends of the Stock Exchange.—Mr. Dunbar.—Duke of Newcastle.—French
Ambassador.—James Bolland.—Extraordinary Incident.—Fortunate
Adventure.—Morals and Manners of the Stock Exchange.—Its Constitution
and Arrangements._ 118

CHAPTER XVIII.

_Life Assurance.—Its Benefits.—Its Commencement.—Suicide of an
Insurer.—Insurance of Invalid Lives.—The Gresham.—Sketch of the West
Middlesex Delusion._ 125

APPENDIX.

_The Anatomy of Exchange Alley; or a System of Stock Jobbing. Proving
that Scandalous Trade, as it is now carried on, to be Knavish in its
Private Practice, and Treason in its Public._ 135

_Stock Tables; Dividend Tables._ 153

CHRONICLES AND CHARACTERS

OF THE

STOCK EXCHANGE.