Chapter IV: Front Matter (4)

"Oh, it's fine of you to talk, when you lose all the money that comes into the family--five thousand dollars in Chicago, and sixty dollars now, for I'll warrant you hadn't paid out a cent of it; and all those accounts against us! Had you paid any bills? had you? You won't answer, but you needn't think to escape and deceive me by such a shallow trick. If you'd paid a bill you'd been keen enough to tell it: you'd have shouted it out long ago. Pretty management! Just like you, shiftless! Why in the name of the five senses didn't you pay out the money before you lost the purse? You might have known you were going to lose it: you always lose everything."

"Bread, please," called Napoleon, who had taken advantage of the confusion to sweep the bread-plate clean.

"In the name of wonder!" exclaimed the mother, snatching a half loaf from the pantry. "There! take it and eat it, and burst--Do," she continued, turning to Dr. Lively, "stop your tramp, tramping round this room, and come and eat your dinner. There's not an atom of reason in spending your time looking for that purse. You'll never see it again. Like enough you dropped it down the well: it would be just like you. I just know that purse is down that well. Carelessness! the idea of dropping your purse down the well!"

Without heeding the rattle, Napoleon went on eating and Dr. Lively went on searching--now in the dining-room, now in the kitchen, now in the hall.

Mrs. Lively soon returned to her life-work: "What's the sense in poking, and poking, and poking around, and around, and around? Mortal eyes will never see that purse again. I've no question but you put it in the stove for a chip this morning when you made the fire. Who ever heard of another man kindling a fire with a purse? Will you eat your dinner, Dr. Lively, or shall I clear away the table? I can't have the work standing round all day."

Notwithstanding his worry, the doctor was hungry, so he replied by seating himself at the table. "There's nothing here to eat," he said, glancing at the empty dishes and plates.

"If that boy hasn't cleared off every dish!" cried the housekeeper. "Why didn't you lick the platters clean, and be done with it?" and she seized an empty dish in either hand and disappeared to replenish it.

While her husband took his dinner she went up stairs and ransacked the bed-room for the missing purse. "What are you sitting there for?" she exclaimed, suddenly re-entering the dining-room, where Dr. Lively was sitting with his arms on the table. "Why don't you get up and look for that purse you lost?"

"No use, you said," Napoleon put in by way of reminder.

"For pity's sake, arn't you done eating yet?"

"Just am," answered the corporal, rising from his seat, yet chewing industriously.

Mrs. Lively began to gather the dirty dishes into a pan. "What are you going to do about it, Dr. Lively?" she asked meanwhile.

"I don't know what we _can_ do about it, except to cut off corners--live more economically."

"As if we could!" cried Mrs. Lively, all ablaze. "Where are there any corners to cut off? In the name of charity, tell me. I've cut and shaved until life is as round and as bare as this plate." With a mighty rattle and clatter she threw the said plate into the dish-pan and jerked up a platter from the table. Holding it in her left hand, she proceeded: "Do you know, Dr. Lively, what your family lives on? Potatoes, Dr. Lively--potatoes; that is, mostly. How much do I pay out a month for help? A half cent? Not a quarter of it. How much is wasted in my housekeeping? Not a single crumb. It would keep any common woman busy cooking for that boy. I tell you, Dr. Lively, I can't economize any more than I do and have done. I might wring and twist and screw in every possible direction, and at the year's end there wouldn't be a nickel to show for all the wringing and twisting and screwing. There's only one way in which the purse can be made up--there's only one way in which economy is possible. You can save that money, Dr. Lively: you're the only member of the family who has a luxury."

"Hang me with a grapevine if I've got any luxury!" said the doctor with something of an amused expression on his face.

"Tobacco," suggested Napoleon.

"Yes, it's tobacco. You can give up the nasty weed, the filthy habit."

"Do it?" asked Napoleon.

"Don't think I shall," replied the doctor coolly.

"Then I'll save the money," responded Mrs. Lively with heroic voice and manner. "I had forgotten: there is one other way. Dr. Lively, I'm housekeeper, laundress, cook, everything to your family. And what do I get for it? Less than any twelve-year-old girl who goes out to service. I have the blessed privilege of lodging in this old Mormon rat-hole, and I have just enough of the very cheapest victuals to keep the breath in my body; and one single, solitary thing that is not absolutely necessary to my existence--one thing that I could possibly live without."

"What?" asked Napoleon, gaping and staring.

"It is sugar--sugar in my coffee. I'll drink my coffee without sugar till that sixty dollars is made up. I'll never touch sugar again till that money is made good--never!" and into the kitchen sailed Mrs. Lively with her pan of dishes.

"Sugar, please," demanded Napoleon the next morning at the breakfast-table. Dr. Lively passed over the sugar-bowl.

"How can you have the heart to take so much?" said the mother, watching Napoleon as he emptied one heaping spoonful and then another into his coffee-cup. "But I might have known you'd leave your mother to bear the burden all alone. All the economizing, all the self-denial, must come on my shoulders. And just look at me!--nothing but skin and bones. I've got to make up everybody's losses, everybody's wasting. It's a rare thing if I get a warm meal with the rest of you: I'm all the while eating up the cold victuals and scraps and burnt things that nobody else will eat."

"I'd eat 'em," said Napoleon.

"Of course you'd eat them. There's nothing you wouldn't eat, in the heavens above or the earth beneath. And all the thanks I get is to be taunted with stinginess."

"Take some?" asked Napoleon, passing the sugar-bowl to his mother.

"Never!" she exclaimed, drawing back as though a viper had been extended to her. "Take the thing away--set it down there by your father's plate. I said I'd use no more sugar till that money was made good. When I say a thing I mean it."

"Now, Priscilla," remonstrated the doctor, "what is the use of breaking in on your lifelong habits? You'll make yourself sick, that's all."

"Dr. Lively, you're trying to tempt me: why can't you uphold me? It will be hard enough at best to make the sacrifice. Yes, I shall make myself sick, but it won't hurt anybody but me. I can get well again, as I've always had to."

"Perhaps so, after a druggist's bill and hired girl's wages. Every spoonful of sugar you save may cost you ten dollars."

"Then, why don't you give up that vile tobacco? I won't use any sugar till you do. All you care about is the money my sickness will cost--my suffering is nothing." Mrs. Lively raised her cup to her lip, then set it back in the saucer with a haste that sent the contents splashing over the sides.

"Bitter?" asked Napoleon.

"Bitter! of course it's bitter--bitter as tansy. It sends the chills creeping up and down my backbone, and the top of my head feels as if it was crawling off. I believe I shall lose my scalp if I don't use sugar."

"To stick it on?" asked Napoleon with a stolid face.

"Oh, it's beautiful in my only child to laugh at a mother's discomfort!" "Ain't a-laughin'," he replied.

"What are you doing if you ain't laughing?"

"Eatin'."

"Of course: you're always eating." Again Mrs. Lively essayed her coffee, but fell back in her chair with an unutterable look. "Oh, I can't!--I cannot do it!" she exclaimed.

"Don't," Napoleon advised.

Mrs. Lively with a sudden jerk sat bolt upright, as straight as a crock. "Who asked you for your advice?" she demanded sharply.

The young Lively swallowed three times distinctly, and then replied, while shaking the pepper-box over his potato, "Nobody."

"Then, why can't you keep it to yourself?"

"Can."

"Then, why don't you do it?"

"Do."

"You exasperating boy! Wouldn't you die if you didn't get the last word?"

"Dunno."

"Look here, Napoleon Lively: you've got to stop your everlasting talking. Your chatter, chatter, chatter just tries me to death. I'm not--"

Here Dr. Lively, overcome with the absurdity of this charge, did a very unusual thing. He broke into laughter so prolonged and overwhelming that Mrs. Lively, after some signal failures to edge in a word of explanation, left the table in the midst of the uproar and dashed up stairs, where she jerked and pounded the beds with a will.

The next day Mrs. Lively was canning some cherries which the doctor had taken in pay for a prescription. The air was filled with the mingled odor of the boiling fruit and of burning sealing-wax. The cans were acting with outrageous perversity, for they were second-hand and the covers ill-fitting. Her blood was almost up to fainting heat, and she was worried all over. She had to do all her preserving in a pint cup, as she expressed it in her contempt for the diminutive proportions of the saucepan which she was using.

"Here 'tis," said Napoleon, suddenly appearing at the kitchen-door.

"Here what is?" demanded Mrs. Lively shortly, without looking up. Her two hands were engaged--one in pressing the cover on a can, the other in pouring wax where a bubble persistently appeared.

"This," answered Napoleon.

"What?"

"Purse."

"Purse!" she screamed. "Is the money in it?" She dropped her work and took eager possession of it. "Where did you find it?"

"Big apple tree," replied Napoleon.

"Under the apple tree?"

"Fork," was the lad's emendation.

"Why in the name of sense do you have to bite off all your sentences? They are like a chicken with its head off. Do you mean to say that you found the purse in the fork of the big apple tree?"

"Do; and pipe."

"Pipe! of course. One might track your father through a howling wilderness by the pipes he'd leave at every half mile. Don't let him know you've found the purse, and to-morrow morning I'm going to see if I can't have some of his bills paid before the money is lost, as it would be if he should get it in his hands."

The next morning Mrs. Lively felt under her pillow, as on a former occasion, and, as on that former occasion, found the purse where she had put it the night before. She gave it into Napoleon's hands after breakfast, and despatched him to settle the bills. In less than half an hour he was back.

"Did you pay all the bills?" she asked.

"No."

"How many?"

"None."

"Why don't you go along and pay those bills, as I bade you?"

"Have been."

"Then, why didn't you settle the bills?"

"Couldn't."

"If you don't tell me what's the matter--Why couldn't you?"

"No money!"

"No money? Where's the purse?"

"Here 'tis;" and he handed it to her.

She opened it and found it empty. "Where's the money?" she demanded in great alarm.

"Dunno."

"What did you do with it?"

"Nothin'."

By dint of a few dozen more questions she arrived at the information that when he had opened the purse to pay the first bill he found it empty.

"Why didn't you look on the floor?"

"Did look."

"And feel in your pocket?"

"Did."

"I suppose you couldn't be satisfied till you'd opened the purse to count the money. You're a perfect Charity Cockloft with your curiosity. And then you went off into one of your dreams, and forgot to clasp the purse. Go look for it right at the spot where you counted the money."

"Didn't count it."

"Well, where you opened the purse in the street."

"Didn't open it in the street."

"The money just crawled out of the purse, did it?"

"Dunno."

The house was searched, the store, the street, but all in vain. Dr. Lively was questioned: Did he take the money from the purse when it was under her pillow? He didn't even know before that the purse had been found. The house had been everywhere securely fastened, and the bed-room door locked.

"Well, it's very mysterious," said Mrs. Lively. "That money went just as the other did in Chicago. We must be haunted by the spirit of some burglar or miser."

Cards were posted in the stores and post-office, offering five dollars reward for the lost money.

"A pretty affair," said Mrs. Lively, "to payout five dollars just for somebody's shiftlessness!"

"To recover sixty we can afford to pay five," said the doctor.

Shortly after this an express package from Chicago was delivered for the doctor at his door. Mrs. Lively was quite excited, hoping she scarce knew what from this arrival. The half hour till the doctor came home to tea seemed interminable. She sat by watching eagerly as the doctor cut the cords and broke the seals and unwrapped--what? Some things very beautiful, but nothing that could answer that ceaseless, persistent cry of the human, "What shall we eat, what shall we drink, and wherewithal shall we be clothed?"

"Nothing but some more of those miserable sea-weeds!" exclaimed Mrs. Lively, "and the express on them was fifty cents."

"They are beautiful," cried the doctor with enthusiasm.

"Beautiful! What have we got to do with the beautiful? We've done with the beautiful for ever. I feel as if I never wanted to see anything beautiful again. And you'll have to spend your time collecting geodes to send back for the miserable trash. I hate those old sea-weeds. You left everything we owned to perish in that fire, and brought away only that case of sea-weeds. I'll take it some time to start the fire in the stove. Beautiful! What right have you to think of the beautiful? It's a disgrace to be as poor as we are. The very bread for this supper isn't paid for, and never will be. Come to supper!" She snapped out these last words in a way inimitable and indescribable.

"Priscilla," said the husband in a sad, solemn way, "I never knew anybody in my life who seemed so utterly exasperated by poverty as you."

"You never knew anybody else that was tried by such poverty."

"I saw thousands after the Chicago fire."

"Yes, when they had the excitement all about them."

"And who is the object of your exasperation? Who is responsible for your circumstances? Who but God?"

"God didn't lose that sixty dollars, and He didn't lose that money in Chicago."

"Well, now, my dear, I'm working hard at my book, and I think I'm making a good thing of it. I hope it'll bring us a lift."

"A book on that horrid subject isn't going to sell. I wouldn't touch it with a pair of tongs: I'd run from it. Nobody'll read it but a few old long-haired geologists. I'd like to know what good all your geology and botany and those other horrid things ever did you. You couldn't make a cent out of all them put together. You're always paying expressage on fossils and bugs and sea-weeds and trash. All that comes of it is just waste."

"Does anything but waste come of your fault-finding?"

"Now, who's finding fault?"

Dr. Lively left the table and took down his case of sea-weeds, and turned it over in his hand.

"The only thing that came through the fire," he said musingly.

"And of what account is it?" said Mrs. Lively.

"It may prove to be of value," he said. "To-night's addition will make my collection very fine. I may take some premiums on it at fairs." He sat down and began to compare the specimens just received with his previous collection.

"What is the use of looking over those things--miserable sea-weeds? You'd better bring in some wood and draw some water: it nearly breaks my back to draw water up that rickety-rackety well."

"Good Heavens!" cried Dr. Lively, springing to his feet like one electrified. "What does it mean?"

Mrs. Lively gazed at him: his hand was full of money, greenbacks.

"I found them here, among the sea-weeds in the case." He counted them out on the table, Mrs. Lively standing by watching him, for once speechless. "It's just the amount we lost, and the same bills. See here: ten five-hundred-dollar bills, and this change that we lost in Chicago; and four ten-dollar bills and four fives that were lost here. They are the same bills. Who put them here?"

"I don't know," replied Mrs. Lively in a low tone: "I didn't." She spoke as though she was dealing with something supernatural.

In the case of sea-weeds, the only thing that came through the fire! How often had she pronounced it worthless! What a spite she had conceived against it! How the sight of it had all along exasperated her!

"It is very strange," said the doctor, believing in his secret soul that his wife had put the money there and forgotten it. "Have you no recollection of putting the money here?" he said cautiously. "Try to think."

"I never put it there," she said in a subdued, dazed way: "I know I never did."

Napoleon came in eating an apple. He was informed of the discovery, and closely questioned. "Don't know nothin' 'bout it," he declared. "Go back to Chicago?" he asked.

"Yes," answered the doctor. "The money's here, however unaccountably: we'll accept the fact and thank God." The doctor's lip quivered, and Mrs. Lively burst into tears. "We will go back home, to the most wonderful city in the world. If possible, we'll buy the very lot where we lived, and build a little house. Many of those who lived in the neighborhood, my old patients, will return, and so I shall have a practice begun. I shall start for Chicago in the morning. You can make an auction of the few traps we have here, and follow as soon as possible. You'll find me at Mrs. B----'s boarding-house on Congress street."

There was some further planning, so that it was eleven o'clock before they retired. Napoleon went to bed hungry that night, if indeed since the Chicago fire he had ever gone to bed in any other condition. He dropped off to sleep, however, and all through his dreams he was eating--oh such good things!--juicy steaks, feathery biscuits, flaky pies, baked apples and cream. He awoke with an empty feeling, an old familiar feeling, which had often caused him to awake contemplating a midnight raid on the cupboard. But poor Napoleon had been restrained by conscientious scruples and by the fear of his mother's tongue, for he appreciated the altered condition of the family. But now they were all rich again there was no longer any necessity for pinching his stomach. There were in the cupboard some biscuits intended for breakfast, and some cold ham. He remembered how tempting they had looked as his mother set them away. Now they fairly haunted him as he lay thinking how favorable the moonlight was to his contemplated burglary. He left his bed, not stealthily: he was not of a nature to be specially mortified by discovery. He made his way to the dining-room. In one of the recesses made by the chimney Dr. Lively had constructed a kind of cupboard, and in the other recess he had put up some shelves, where their few books and the case of sea-weeds lay. Napoleon cut some generous slices of ham, and with the biscuits constructed several sandwiches. Then he seated himself by the window for the benefit of the moonlight. This brought him within a few feet of the shelves where the sea-weeds were. There he sat in his night-dress, his bare feet on the chair-round, vigorously eating his sandwiches. Suddenly he heard a soft, stealthy, gliding noise in the hall. It was as though trailing drapery was sweeping over the naked floor. He gave a gulping swallow, paused in his eating and listened intently. The stillness of death reigned through the house. He crammed half a sandwich in his mouth and began a cautious chewing. Again the trailing sound, and again his jaws were stilled. At the door entered a tall figure in flowing white robes. Steadily it advanced upon him, seeming to walk or glide on the air. For once there was something in which he was more interested than in eating. At last the ghost stood close beside him, and he saw with his staring eyes that it wore a veil and carried its left hand in its bosom. The boy sat rooted with horror, his tongue loaded, his cheeks puffed with his feast, afraid to swallow lest the noise of the act should reveal him. The figure withdrew its hand from its bosom: it held a roll of bankbills. It reached out for the case of sea-weeds, laid the bills carefully between the cards, returned these to the case and the case to the shelf. It stood a moment in the broad moonlight, then lifted the veil, and revealed to the astonished boy the face of his mother. She stood within two feet of him, her eyes on his face, but she did not speak.

"Mother! mother!" he cried with a sense of the supernatural on him, "what's the matter?" He seized her by the arm: he shook her.

"What is it? what do you want? where am I? what does this mean?" were questions she asked like one newly awakened. "What are you doing here, Napoleon?"

"Eatin'."

"Eating! what for?"

"Hungry."

"What time is it?"

"Dunno."

"What am I doing here?"

"Hidin' money;" and Napoleon took a bite from his long-neglected sandwich.

"What do you mean?"

"Mean _that_."

"Stop bobbing off your sentences. Tell me what it all means."

Napoleon stood up, laid his sandwiches on the chair, took down the sea-weeds and showed her the bills among them.

"Who put these here?"

"You."

"When?"

"Just now."

"I did not."

"You did."

By this time Dr. Lively, who had been restless and excited, was awake, and down he came to the family gathering. By dint of persistent inquiries he at length arrived at the facts in the case, and drew the inevitable conclusion that his wife had been walking in her sleep, and that to her somnambulism were to be referred the mysterious emptyings of his purse.

Mrs. Lively was mortified and subdued at being convicted of all the mischief which she had so persistently charged to her husband. And she said this to him with her arms in a very unusual position--that is, around her husband's neck.

"Oh, you needn't feel that way," he said, choking back the quick tears. "If you hadn't hid that money maybe we never could have got back home. But I'll hide my own money, after this, while I'm awake: I sha'n't give you another chance to hide money in sea-weeds. Strange, I should have snatched just those sea-weeds, and left everything else to burn! All these things make me feel that God has been very near us."

"Yes," said the wife, "He has whipped me till He's made me mind."

The husband kissed her good-bye, for he was starting for Chicago. Then he stepped out into the dewy morning, and hurried along the silent streets, witnesses of the crushed aspirations of the thousands who had gone out from them. But he thought not of this. A gorgeous Aurora was coming up the eastern heights: his lost love was found. He was going home: all earth was glorified.

SARAH WINTER KELLOGG.

[Footnote 1: While desirous of affording full scope to a talent for realistic description, we must protest against allusions bordering on personality.--ED.]

HISTORY OF THE CRISIS.

The crisis of 1873 seems destined to be the most memorable of all the purely financial panics in the history of the United States. Certainly no panic, involving such widespread disturbance of the ordinary course of business was ever before known, either in the Old World or the New, on a paper-money basis, for the collapse of the speculative bubble at Vienna a few months earlier was a mere trifle in comparison, although it set us the example of throttling a panic by closing the avenue to the exchange of securities. I mention Vienna as a case in point, for Austrian finances are such that the nation is kept in a chronic state of suspension, and I am not aware that any prominent _bourse_ in Europe except the one mentioned ever adopted a similar proceeding in a like emergency.

This panic was not the result of paper-money inflation, nor of inflated values, nor of reckless over-trading, nor of in-ordinate speculation. The trade and commerce of the country were in a sound and prosperous condition, and the prices of securities in Wall street were, on the average, hardly in excess of real values, and in some instances a little below them. It is true that the old trouble of tight money was beginning to be felt, and the bears on the Stock Exchange were trying to aggravate the natural monetary activity which invariably attends the flow of currency westward to move the crops early in the fall of the year, by "locking up" greenbacks and otherwise. On the 6th of September the weekly return of the New York banks, State and National, belonging to the Clearing-house, showed that their legal-tender reserve had fallen to a little less than half a million above the twenty-five per cent., which the National banks in the large cities are required by the "National Currency Act" to keep on hand against their deposits and notes; but this excited no apprehension, and hardly occasioned surprise among those aware of the drain of money for crop-moving purposes--the outward flow from Chicago and Cincinnati to what I may call the agricultural districts having been much larger than usual this season. After the four months of unparalleled and continuous stringency experienced in the previous winter and spring, when rates varying from a sixty-fourth to seven-eighths of one per cent., per diem were paid in addition to the legal seven per cent, per annum for call loans on first-class collaterals--during all of which time stocks were firmly supported--it is not to be supposed that Wall street or the general public felt much uneasiness about the loan market or the financial prospect generally. The deposits in the New York banks not only showed no falling off, but were over two hundred and twelve millions against two hundred and nine millions at the corresponding period in the previous year. The fall trade had opened auspiciously; the earnings of the railways were from five to fifteen per cent., larger than in 1872; the crops were abundant--the cotton crop, in particular, being estimated at four millions of bales--and it was supposed that the experience of stringency just referred to had placed the banks, the speculative community and the merchants in a conservative attitude, prepared against a recurrence of dear money, and that therefore we should escape a repetition of the painful ordeal.

The element of distrust, however, aroused by the suspension of the Brooklyn Trust Company, and subsequently that of the New York Warehouse Company, in connection with the failure of Francis Skiddy & Co, and another old-established mercantile house similarly situated, had not died out when the suspension of Kenyon Cox & Co., involving that, also, of the Chicago and Canada Southern Railway Company, fell like a thunderbolt on Wall street. This failure derived its importance from the fact of Daniel Drew being a general partner in the house, although originally he had gone into it as a special partner with $300,000 capital, and from its being the financial agent of this new but important enterprise--a line of large extent, and involving very heavy expenditures in construction and equipment. Kenyon Cox & Co., as financial agents, and Daniel Drew individually, as a director and officer of the company, had approved its contracts and endorsed its acceptances. A large amount of the latter became due on the 13th of September, and a million and a half of them in amount would have matured within thirty days afterward; but on the morning of that date the firm formally suspended, and the joint obligations of the house and the railway company went to protest. Fortunately for the bondholders, the road had just previously been completed, although much still remained to be done to put it in the condition originally designed. Here comes the rub and the cause of the whole difficulty. The company depended for its means of construction on the sale of its bonds, as so many companies before it had done. The sale of the bonds in this country fell far short of the expectations of the financial agents, and they were equally disappointed in a market for them abroad. They were thus caught in the unpleasant position of being pledged to heavy obligations with little or no money coming in to meet them with. Failing their ability to pay these out of their own pockets, or relief in some way from the company, the result was inevitable. As, however, Daniel Drew was believed to be a man of great wealth, notwithstanding his loss of nearly a million and a half by the North-western "corner" in November, 1872, the failure of his house created much surprise and distrust. All new railway undertakings and the bankers identified with them were immediately regarded with suspicion, and that suspicion was fatal.

The effect on the Stock Exchange was immediate, though less visible in the decline of prices than in a reversal of the current of speculation in favor of the bears, in a disturbance of credits and in general uneasiness. Jay Cooke & Co., who were known to be heavily involved in that colossal undertaking, the construction of the Northern Pacific Railway, and Fisk & Hatch, who had identified themselves with the Central Pacific, and subsequently the Ohio and Chesapeake Road, as financial agents, were the first to feel the shock in the shape of a run on their deposits; and on the 18th of September the former firm suspended simultaneously at its offices in New York, Philadelphia and Washington, dragging down with it the First National Bank of Washington, of which one of the partners, Ex-Governor H.D. Cooke, was president. The downfall of this great house was regarded as little less than a national misfortune, and the prevailing distrust was so aggravated by the event that Wall street went wild over the news; and "long" stocks were thrown overboard on the Exchange without regard to price, while the bears were emboldened to put out fresh "shorts" with a recklessness never before witnessed, the question of real values being entirely unheeded in the excitement and demoralization that prevailed. On the following morning the suspension of Fisk & Hatch--a house only second in prominence--sent another thrill of consternation through the street. Prices on the Stock Exchange continued to fall rapidly, and during the day twenty-one additional failures occurred among stock-houses and private bankers belonging to the Board, nearly all of whom had been of good standing and accustomed to transact a large business. Early on Saturday, the 20th, the Union Trust Company, an institution with seven millions and a half of deposits, closed its doors, and the National Trust Company, with about five millions of deposits, did likewise; while the National Bank of the Commonwealth failed, apparently with little hope of resumption, mainly in consequence of having certified cheques for a private banking and stock firm to the amount of $225,000 in excess of its balance. The Bank of North America was temporarily embarrassed from a similar cause, another stock firm having similarly defaulted to no less an amount than $400,000. Here we have two conspicuous instances of the danger attending the custom of certifying brokers' cheques for large sums beyond the amount to their credit; and no greater warnings than these should be needed by the banks to decline such risks, which are neither justified by the profits resulting therefrom, nor just to their stockholders and depositors, while they are clearly opposed to the spirit of the National Banking Law.

Following the suspensions last referred to, Wall street grew still wilder than before, and in the rush to sell securities many of the brokers abandoned themselves to a state of frenzy, while rumors of fresh failures passed from lip to lip with startling rapidity. The fact that during the morning the associated banks, in accordance with the recommendation of a committee of their own officers appointed on the previous day, had agreed to issue to each other seven per cent. certificates of deposit to the amount of ten millions, on the security of government bonds at par and approved bills receivable at seventy-five per cent. of their face value, as well as to equalize the legal-tender notes held by all for their common benefit and security, had no influence in tranquilizing the public mind, although it showed a determination on their part to stand or fall together. As these certificates were to run till the 1st of November, and to be used as the equivalent of legal tenders in making the exchanges among themselves, the importance, as well as the advisability, of the measure, under the circumstances, was apparent, although the limitation as to amount looked like the application of a standard of measurement to that which could not be measured. The legal-tender notes, when "stocked" preparatory to their equal division, amounted to a fraction less than ten per cent. of the deposits.

The pressure of sales of stock was almost entirely for cash. No money could be borrowed, either at the banks or elsewhere, on securities of any kind, and loans--which the borrowers were unable to pay off--were being called in in all directions. As compared with the quotations current on the eve of Kenyon Cox & Co.'s failure, the stock-list showed a decline of from twelve to thirty per cent.

At noon the distraction was so great, and the sacrifices being made were so enormous, that universal ruin appeared to be impending; and the seeming impossibility of doing business any longer in such a condition of affairs without bringing about a state of chaos, and involving the banks in the general destruction, made itself manifest to the president and governing committee of the Stock Exchange, who yielded to the solicitations of the banks and closed the Stock Exchange at half-past twelve until further notice.

The reeling crowd paused to take breath, and felt a sense of relief in this sudden stoppage of the course of business, although accomplished by a proceeding so unexpected and revolutionary. The usual Saturday bank statement was omitted, and men left Wall street that evening only to gather in a dense crowd at the Fifth Avenue Hotel to discuss the situation.

Meanwhile, the failure of Jay Cooke & Co. in Philadelphia was quickly followed there by the suspension of several prominent private banking and stock firms and some small ones, a panic in stocks, and a run upon the banks, involving the failure of two of their number--the Citizens' and the Union Banking Company. Advices of a few suspensions of banks and banking-houses in different parts of the country had also been received, none of much importance, but all serving to deepen the prevailing gloom, and make men fear that the worst was still to come. Representative bankers and merchants had been telegraphing to the government at Washington for some measure of relief from the moment of Jay Cooke & Co.'s suspension, but none had as yet been extended, except in the shape of an order, on Saturday, to buy ten millions of United States bonds, of which the assistant treasurer was, in consequence of the excitement, only able to buy less than two millions and a half at the equivalent of par in gold, the price to which he was limited.

The President, who had been on his way from Pittsburg to Long Branch on Saturday, was, in company with the Secretary of the Treasury, at the Fifth Avenue Hotel on Sunday, the 21st, and gave audience to a large number of leading merchants and bankers, who urged upon him the necessity of immediate action on the part of the Treasury to save the country from further disaster, the issue of the "reserve" of forty-four millions of greenbacks as a loan to, or deposit with, the banks being the remedy generally suggested. The President, however, was firmly opposed to this, and suggested that a week of Sundays would probably afford more relief than anything else, but promised to do whatever seemed advisable within the limits of the law. On the next morning the assistant treasurer gave notice that he would continue the purchase of bonds, paying for them at the average prices of the Saturday previous. This he did until Thursday morning, when he ceased buying, twelve millions in all having been bought up to that time, and the available currency balance in the Treasury, without encroaching on the forty-four millions of unissued greenbacks, being exhausted.

On Monday there was a run on most of the city savings banks, which was met by an agreement among their officers to avail themselves of their legal privilege to require thirty or sixty days' notice of the intended withdrawal of deposits; and this being announced by the respective institutions, the run, as a natural consequence, ceased, and, fortunately, without the slightest popular disturbance. On the 22d the Security Trust Company and a private banking-house in Pittsburg, Pa., suspended, as also a banking-firm at Wilmington, Del. The failure of Henry Clews & Co. on the afternoon of Tuesday, the 23d, followed by that of Clews, Habicht & Co., London, caused fresh uneasiness. This house, being the financial agent of the Burlington and Cedar Rapids Railway, a new line, had been run upon for some days previously, and it showed much strength in holding out so long. The news was almost simultaneously received that the Baltimore banks had agreed upon the issue of six per cent. certificates in the manner adopted by the New York association, and that five National banks in Petersburg, Va., had closed their doors. On the morning of the 24th Howes & Macy, known to be a very strong and conservative banking-house, suspended, and this added fuel to the flame of excitement, and wild rumors of impending failures were again afloat. The steady but quiet run which had been kept up on the banks now increased, and they decided upon the issue of another ten millions of certificates, and a third issue of a like amount, if required. They also agreed to certify cheques "payable only through the Clearing-house" until the first of November, the payment of currency for cheques, for the accommodation of their dealers, to be optional in the interval with each individual bank. This involved a suspension of currency payments by all the banks in the association. The failure of the Dollar Savings Bank and a private banking-house at Richmond, Va., was reported on the same day, as also that of a banking-firm at Baltimore, and another at Wilkesbarre, Pa. On the 25th there was no change in the situation in New York, but the banks of Cincinnati, Chicago and New Orleans suspended currency payments, as those of Baltimore had done previously, and two banks at Memphis, Tenn., three at Augusta, Ga., all those at Danville, Va., and a savings bank at Selma, Ala., closed their doors. On the 26th six National banks at Chicago suspended, and a trust company, and two banks at Charleston, S.C., in addition to a banking-house at Washington; and the last day of the week, the 27th, opened on anything but an encouraging prospect. The telegrams from Europe reported an unsettled market for American securities; gold for a short time rose to 115-1/2; seven of the Louisville banks suspended, and the Boston and Washington banks voted to suspend currency payments, and (those of each city) to issue ten millions of certificates on the New York basis. But toward the close of the day favorable rumors were circulated regarding settlements on the street; and a petition for reopening the Stock Exchange was circulated, while stocks, which had been informally quoted very low, advanced several per cent.

During all this week there had been a dead-lock in business in Wall street, although a crowd of persons not belonging to the Exchange gathered on Broad street daily to buy or sell stocks for cash on delivery, the sellers forced by their necessities, and the buyers eager to secure stocks at lower prices than had been known for years. But there were so few persons provided with "the sinews of war" that the aggregate of transactions was small. The usual weekly bank statement was again omitted by the Clearing-house from motives of policy, but it transpired that the whole of the New York associated banks held on the morning of the 27th only twelve millions two hundred thousand of greenbacks, an aggregate still further reduced, at one time, to a point below ten millions, against nearly thirty-five millions--bank average--on the 20th, the date of the last statement issued. Their determination to sustain each other was, however, so strong that it tended to inspire confidence in their ability to weather the storm. It was also made known that they had agreed, on the resumption of business by the Stock Exchange, not to certify cheques except against actual balances while any certificates of their own issue remained outstanding. Twenty millions of these had been issued up to this time, and the additional ten millions before referred to were ordered to be issued in like manner, as required. The Treasury paid out during that week, including the previous Saturday, in New York and elsewhere, about thirty-five millions of greenbacks--namely, twenty-two millions in exchange for $5000 and $10,000 certificates of deposit--used as legal tenders at the Clearing-house, and presented by the banks for redemption, for which there is a special reserve of notes in the Treasury--and about thirteen millions for the purchase of the twelve millions of bonds already mentioned. It also sent to the National banks in the West and South three millions of new notes, issued under the act of July, 1870, authorizing an addition of fifty-four millions to the three hundred millions of bank-note circulation previously outstanding, nearly the whole of which has now been issued.

The bank failures West and South, and the pressing requirements to move produce to the ports, led to very urgent demands for currency in Wall street, and certified bank-cheques were quoted at a discount of from two to four per cent. as compared with greenbacks, while fears were entertained that the continued suspension of business would be only productive of harm. Hence, when the governing committee decided to reopen the Stock Exchange on the morning of Tuesday, the 30th, a feeling of positive relief was experienced.

On Monday, the 29th, only two unimportant country-bank failures were reported, and encouraging accounts were received from the West, although the suspension of a wool-manufacturing company in New York and an iron-manufacturing company in Massachusetts--each employing some hundreds of men--and the discharge of more than a thousand men from the locomotive works at Paterson, N.J., showed that the crisis had already affected labor. On all sides an anxiety to retrench was shown, and large numbers, in the aggregate, were thrown out of employment all over the country. The retail trade was very unfavorably affected, the losses sustained by the crisis, combined with the scarcity of currency, causing people to expend as little as possible; and this feature, resulting from the crisis, is likely to be a marked one for a considerable time to come.

During the previous week bills on Europe had been, as a rule, unsalable, and rates of exchange were depressed to a very low point, bankers' sterling at sixty days being quoted on Friday at 103 @ 105, and merchants' bills at 101 @ 102-1/2. The difficulty or impossibility of selling exchange greatly embarrassed shippers and retarded the movement of produce from the West; but owing to a heavy reduction by the steamship lines of the rates of freight to induce shipments, strenuous efforts were made to take advantage of it, and the exports from New York for each of the two weeks noticed were valued at about six millions and a half, while for the week ending October 4 the valuation was unusually large--namely, $8,378,130. This was the most encouraging feature of the time, especially in view of the previous heavy preponderance of the exports over the imports at New York, the value of the former having increased forty-eight millions during the first nine months of 1873, as compared with the corresponding period in 1872, while the latter were twenty-seven millions less, and while our exports of specie were also seventeen and a half millions smaller. The receipts for customs duties, however, fell far short of the usual amount, and the movement of goods out of bond was correspondingly light. Under the improved feeling visible on Monday, the 29th, the foreign exchange market became less unsettled, and rates began to improve rapidly; so that on Tuesday bankers' bills on England at sixty days had risen to 106-1/2 @ 106-3/4, and mercantile to 104-1/2 @ 105-1/2. Before this, however, the Bank of England had advanced its rate of discount from three to four per cent., and again from four to five per cent., and we had received cable advices of the shipment of about eight millions of gold from England for the United States, with further shipments in anticipation, partly the proceeds of American negotiations previous to the panic, and partly to make grain payments. The shippers of cotton and general produce were cheered by this opening of a market for their bills at such a decided improvement in rates, and on the Produce Exchange the return of confidence was marked, while quotations, which had been depressed, showed an upward tendency.

Meanwhile, the Stock Exchange opened punctually at the appointed time, and the opening prices were higher than those previously current in the informal market on the street. But it would have been too much to expect a settled market after such demoralization as had prevailed and such ruinous sacrifices as had been made. The improvement was not sustained, and prices were depressed from two to eight per cent., during the next three days, chiefly under sales to make settlements between parties on the street.

Occasional failures, both among stock and banking-houses and the mercantile and manufacturing community, and in as well as out of New York, were still reported, including three large city dry-goods firms; and the pressure for greenbacks to send to the country continued to be so severe that from three to four per cent., was paid for them, as compared with certified bank-cheques, for several days, though the premium dwindled to one-half and one per cent., before the end of the week, advancing a week later, however, to one and one and a half. The difficulty of moving produce from the West also continued very great, owing to the almost total dead-lock in the domestic exchanges, but otherwise the excitement and alarm attending the crisis seemed to have passed away, leaving only its depressing effects still visible. Money became comparatively accessible to first-class borrowers on call. But the bank statement was again omitted on the following Saturday, and it was announced that none would be made until after the banks had resumed greenback payments, and till the certificates of their own creation had been withdrawn. The deposits held by the banks at the close of business on that day, October 4, had been reduced to about a hundred and fifty-three millions, against over two hundred and seven millions and a quarter on September 13.

Before the middle of the month the continued drain of gold to the United States--the shipment from England of about sixteen millions of dollars having been reported from the beginning of the crisis to the 18th of October--caused the Bank of England to further advance its discount rate to six per cent., and shortly afterward to seven per cent. But, notwithstanding, the price of gold gradually declined to 107-3/4, a lower point than it had touched since 1861. The New York banks meanwhile lost rather than gained strength, and their aggregate of greenbacks under control of the Clearing-house was reduced to less than six millions, although this fact was not published. It was, however, at the same time believed that three or four millions more were distributed among them, of which they made no return to the association. Currency during the latter half of the month began to return somewhat rapidly from the West in the shape of collections by the merchants, and this, in turn, led to remittances to the South, where it was greatly needed for the cotton crop, the movement of which had been almost entirely arrested. Affairs on the Stock Exchange were, in the interval, unsettled, and enormously heavy sacrifices were made in order to adjust differences between brokers, as well as by outside parties in pressing need of cash. On Tuesday, the 14th of October, almost another panic prevailed, and prices touched a lower point than they had before reached. New York Central sold down to 82, Lake Shore to 57-1/2, Western Union to 45, Rock Island to 80-1/2, Pacific Mail to 25, Wabash to 32-3/4, Ohio and Mississippi to 21, Union Pacific to 15-1/2, North-western to 32, St. Paul to 23, St. Paul Preferred to 50, and Harlem to 100, while the feeling of the street was worse than at any time during the crisis; but a quick recovery took place from the extreme point of depression, and the resumption of greenback payments by the Cincinnati banks, following that of the Chicago banks, led to an improved feeling in both financial and commercial circles. The National Trust Company of New York also, about the same time, resumed payment. It was noticeable, however, that little or none of the money reported by the express companies as coming from the West was received by the New York banks--a natural result of their suspension of currency payments, which virtually forced individuals and corporations to be their own bankers. The banks had ceased to perform this function: they were utterly unable to maintain their reserve, cash cheques or discount commercial paper for their customers, and so far the National banking system had failed.

Having reviewed the disastrous course of this crisis up to the date of writing, I will briefly consider its causes. It may be traced remotely, in some degree, to the distrust of American railway securities in Europe which attended the reckless administration of the Erie Railway under Fisk and Gould, and which lingered after their overthrow, indisposing capitalists, as well as small investors, to have anything to do with American railways. It is true that a market still remained there for these securities, but it was a much more limited one than it probably would have been but for the Erie scandal, and within the last year or two it was entirely glutted. Financial agents found it impossible to float a new American railway loan even where the security offered was a first mortgage bond. Thus, Jay Cooke & Co. were greatly disappointed with respect to the sale of their Northern Pacific bonds abroad, and nearly as much so in the demand for them at home; but they were pledged to the undertaking, their solvency became dependent on its success, and they were sanguine that confidence in the great enterprise would grow with every mile of new road constructed.

Mr. Jay Cooke undoubtedly looked forward to a subsidy from Congress for carrying the mails over the new line, and in all likelihood would have obtained it but for the Credit Mobilier _exposé_, which caused both Congress and the people to "shut down," not only on everything having the appearance of a "job," but on much besides. The ill odor into which that investigation brought the Union Pacific Railway and all who had been connected with its construction was a heavy blow at new enterprises of a similar character where government land-grants were involved; and the vexatious suit which Congress authorized against the Union Pacific Company and all concerned was another blow at confidence in the same direction.