eir shares by suffering them to be sold to pay the calls.
This game went on for nearly three years--all 'calls' and no
dividends; until at length it would have been difficult to find five
persons out of the original 500 who held shares in the Babel and
Lowriver Steam Navigation Company, and there was next to nobody left
to _call_ upon.

Years have rolled on since then. Lowriver has grown into a popular and
populous marine summer residence. Mr Montague Whalebone, who knew what
he was about, having bought and leased the building-ground, has become
the owner of a vast property increasing in value every day. Larboard
Starboard, Esq., is on the way to become a millionaire, and has
several new boats building for the company's service at the present
moment. Messrs Boiler & Rodd have quintupled their establishment, and
are in a condition to execute government contracts. Erebus Carbon,
Esq., has found a market in the company for hundreds of thousands of
tons of coal, and, from keeping a solitary wharf, has come to be the
owner of a fleet of colliers. At this hour, the company consists of
six individuals--the four original projectors, and a couple of old
codgers--'knowing files,' who had the penetration, in the beginning,
to see through the 'bearing dodge,' and would not be beaten or
frightened off. They paid up every call upon shares, and bought
others--and then, by shewing a bold front, asserted a voice in the
management, and crushed in to a full and fair share of the profits.
They have made solid fortunes by the speculation; while the original
shareholders, whose money brought the company into existence, have
reaped nothing but losses and vexation in return for their capital.

But enough, and more than enough, on the score of the delusive farces
which, with pretences almost as transparent as the above, are from
time to time played off for the purpose of easing the public of their
superfluous cash. Let us glance briefly at a speculation of a
different kind, no less a bubble as it proved, but one whose tragic
issues have already wrought the wreck of many innocent families, and
which, at the present moment, under the operation of the Winding-up
Act, is darkening with ruin and the fear of ruin a hundred humble
abodes. We have good reason to know its history too well; and we
shall, in as few words as possible, present the facts most important
to be known to the reader's consideration, with the view of
inculcating caution by the m