登陆注册
15479100000014

第14章 Chapter V(2)

And once the change was made Cowperwood was convinced that this new work was more suited to him in every way--as easy and more profitable, of course. In the first place, the firm of Tighe & Co., unlike that of Waterman & Co., was located in a handsome green-gray stone building at 66 South Third Street, in what was then, and for a number of years afterward, the heart of the financial district. Great institutions of national and international import and repute were near at hand--Drexel & Co., Edward Clark & Co., the Third National Bank, the First National Bank, the Stock Exchange, and similar institutions. Almost a score of smaller banks and brokerage firms were also in the vicinity. Edward Tighe, the head and brains of this concern, was a Boston Irishman, the son of an immigrant who had flourished and done well in that conservative city. He had come to Philadelphia to interest himself in the speculative life there. "Sure, it's a right good place for those of us who are awake," he told his friends, with a slight Irish accent, and he considered himself very much awake. He was a medium-tall man, not very stout, slightly and prematurely gray, and with a manner which was as lively and good-natured as it was combative and self-reliant. His upper lip was ornamented by a short, gray mustache.

"May heaven preserve me," he said, not long after he came there, "these Pennsylvanians never pay for anything they can issue bonds for." It was the period when Pennsylvania's credit, and for that matter Philadelphia's, was very bad in spite of its great wealth.

"If there's ever a war there'll be battalions of Pennsylvanians marching around offering notes for their meals. If I could just live long enough I could get rich buyin' up Pennsylvania notes and bonds. I think they'll pay some time; but, my God, they're mortal slow! I'll be dead before the State government will ever catch up on the interest they owe me now."

It was true. The condition of the finances of the state and city was most reprehensible. Both State and city were rich enough; but there were so many schemes for looting the treasury in both instances that when any new work had to be undertaken bonds were necessarily issued to raise the money. These bonds, or warrants, as they were called, pledged interest at six per cent.; but when the interest fell due, instead of paying it, the city or State treasurer, as the case might be, stamped the same with the date of presentation, and the warrant then bore interest for not only its original face value, but the amount then due in interest. In other words, it was being slowly compounded. But this did not help the man who wanted to raise money, for as security they could not be hypothecated for more than seventy per cent. of their market value, and they were not selling at par, but at ninety. A man might buy or accept them in foreclosure, but he had a long wait. Also, in the final payment of most of them favoritism ruled, for it was only when the treasurer knew that certain warrants were in the hands of "a friend" that he would advertise that such and such warrants--those particular ones that he knew about--would be paid.

What was more, the money system of the United States was only then beginning slowly to emerge from something approximating chaos to something more nearly approaching order. The United States Bank, of which Nicholas Biddle was the progenitor, had gone completely in 1841, and the United States Treasury with its subtreasury system had come in 1846; but still there were many, many wildcat banks, sufficient in number to make the average exchange-counter broker a walking encyclopedia of solvent and insolvent institutions.

Still, things were slowly improving, for the telegraph had facilitated stock-market quotations, not only between New York, Boston, and Philadelphia, but between a local broker's office in Philadelphia and his stock exchange. In other words, the short private wire had been introduced. Communication was quicker and freer, and daily grew better.

Railroads had been built to the South, East, North, and West.

There was as yet no stock-ticker and no telephone, and the clearing-house had only recently been thought of in New York, and had not yet been introduced in Philadelphia. Instead of a clearing-house service, messengers ran daily between banks and brokerage firms, balancing accounts on pass-books, exchanging bills, and, once a week, transferring the gold coin, which was the only thing that could be accepted for balances due, since there was no stable national currency. "On 'change," when the gong struck announcing the close of the day's business, a company of young men, known as "settlement clerks," after a system borrowed from London, gathered in the center of the room and compared or gathered the various trades of the day in a ring, thus eliminating all those sales and resales between certain firms which naturally canceled each other. They carried long account books, and called out the transactions--"Delaware and Maryland sold to Beaumont and Company," "Delware and Maryland sold to Tighe and Company," and so on. This simplified the bookkeeping of the various firms, and made for quicker and more stirring commercial transactions.

Seats "on 'change" sold for two thousand dollars each. The members of the exchange had just passed rules limiting the trading to the hours between ten and three (before this they had been any time between morning and midnight), and had fixed the rates at which brokers could do business, in the face of cut-throat schemes which had previously held. Severe penalties were fixed for those who failed to obey. In other words, things were shaping up for a great 'change business, and Edward Tighe felt, with other brokers, that there was a great future ahead.

同类推荐
  • 外诊法

    外诊法

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 诗概

    诗概

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 花草蒙拾

    花草蒙拾

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 佛说温室洗浴众僧经

    佛说温室洗浴众僧经

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • Tales of the Argonauts

    Tales of the Argonauts

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
热门推荐
  • 神祇御灵之心

    神祇御灵之心

    很多人渴望拥有超能力,因为这样可以成为英雄。一次偶然又注定的机会,毫不起眼的金天打开了新世界的大门,看到了平常人一辈子也接触不到的神奇。当你拥有一项能力时,欲望的膨胀会让你忘记本真,最终走向深渊。名为“神祇”的异能力,就在不知不觉间,命运齿轮已经悄然转动。“当你选择这条路后,就注定你不是英雄,你只能孤独地走下去,无法回头。”感谢阅文书评团提供书评支持!
  • 冬至以春

    冬至以春

    我站在金色盎然的麦田里,闻着属于麦子的香味,眼睛竟滑下了晶莹的泪珠“你怎么么可以骗我呢?”我茫然的问“你说过,你会陪我在这里拍婚纱照的………将来结婚了,就挂在大厅里,让朋友们看我们秀恩爱。可是……”我自嘲的笑了,但没有第一次他对我说的时候的快乐,而是……苦涩的。
  • 乱国战事

    乱国战事

    在一个混乱的时代,人们互相残杀着,掠夺着,只有勇敢顽强的人才能笑到最后,这故事就发生在战国时期....
  • 噬心情毒

    噬心情毒

    一场浩劫,她从天堂跌入地狱,他如同谪仙出现在眼前,将她救离苦海,却又在失去至亲的算计和打击中忘却前尘,他将如同稚儿的她护在自己的羽翼下遮风挡雨,当一切重现眼前,时局动荡,两朝相争,强大如他,又如何抉择。(本文纯属虚构,请勿模仿。)
  • 特能作奇遇记

    特能作奇遇记

    穿越小说男女主角互相穿越到对方的时代,通过一块灵石完成两个人的穿越,男主是富家少主,女主大龄剩女恐婚,最后男主帮女主找到她的白马王子,但是女主却把男主生活搞得一团糟,最后还点男主自己穿越回去处理女主留下的麻烦事。
  • 那些年我们一起走过的路

    那些年我们一起走过的路

    人生就是一场梦,回首往事,那些如梦般的回忆历历在目……青春就像是一本教科书,教会我们如何去失去,如何去承受,如何去珍惜!爱情是一种甜蜜的负担,没有爱情的日子会让人觉得乏味,拥有爱情以后便要学会苦心经营,那种随随便便就开始,又草草率率结束的不叫爱情,是缺爱。
  • 网游之烽火战国

    网游之烽火战国

    每个男人都有一个梦,一个当将军的梦,当虚拟游戏热潮来临,你愿不愿意横刀立马随我一起征战沙场?
  • 我若安好,她定是晴天

    我若安好,她定是晴天

    一场意外中,他们从陌生人变成了最熟悉的人,幸福也好,心酸也罢他们都一一踏过,可越是以为到尽头的时候,越来越多的秘密暴露在他们面前……前方模糊的路,谁都看不清楚,当他们都看尽人间百态,体会世间沧桑的时候,他们,却因为她的无知,她的固执,早已天涯一方……
  • 恋爱祈愿书

    恋爱祈愿书

    讲述一个单纯女孩的心路历程。
  • EXO之我想

    EXO之我想

    初见,她是他的救命恩人,他对她一见钟情,再见,他不知道她是她,她开始对他展开追求,他对她的爱不了了之,她慢慢的打听他的一切,他慢慢接受了她的存在,他一直没有告诉她,自己爱她,她就再也不见了