to prove profitable, but to make head against the lax principles of
the present age. Leave me alone to tickle him. I consider his name, and
those of one or two others belonging to the same meeting-house,--fellows
with bank-stock and all sorts of tin,--as perfectly secure. These
dissenters smell a premium from an almost incredible distance. We can
fill up the rest of the committee with ciphers, and the whole thing is
done."

"But the engineer--we must announce such an officer as a matter of
course."

"I never thought of that," said Bob. "Couldn't we hire a fellow from one
of the steamboats?"

"I fear that might get us into trouble. You know there are such things
as gradients and sections to be prepared. But there's Watty Solder, the
gas-fitter, who failed the other day. He's a sort of civil engineer
by trade, and will jump at the proposal like a trout at the tail of a
May-fly."

"Agreed. Now then, let's fix the number of shares. This is our first
experiment, and I think we ought to be moderate. No sound political
economist is avaricious. Let us say twelve thousand, at twenty pounds
apiece."

"So be it."

"Well then, that's arranged. I'll see Sawley and the rest to-morrow,
settle with Solder, and then write out the prospectus. You look in upon
me in the evening, and we'll revise it together. Now, by your leave,
let's have a Welsh rabbit and another tumbler to drink success and
prosperity to the Glenmutchkin Railway."

I confess that, when I rose on the morrow, with a slight headache and
a tongue indifferently parched, I recalled to memory, not without
perturbation of conscience and some internal qualms, the conversation of
the previous evening. I felt relieved, however, after two spoonfuls of
carbonate of soda, and a glance at the newspaper, wherein I perceived
the announcement of no less than four other schemes equally preposterous
with our own. But, after all, what right had I to assume that the
Glenmutchkin project would prove an ultimate failure? I had not a
scrap of statistical information that might entitle me to form such an
opinion. At any rate, Parliament, by substituting the Board of Trade as
an initiating body of inquiry, had created a responsible tribunal, and
freed us from the chance of obloquy. I saw before me a vision of six
months' steady gambling, at manifest advantage, in the shares, before
a report could possibly be pronounced, or our proceedings be in any way
overhauled. Of course, I attende