Munroe & Munroe _esclandre_, the details of which
plainly showed eminent financiers in the vulgar business of
stock-washing. I frankly treated the subject in _Everybody's_, and as it
is part of the history of the movement, I reproduce the passage:

The average man is prone to lose sight of perfidy in magnitude and to
say, when he hears all the facts: "At least these rascals hunt big
game." I wish to say here that such distinction is undeserved. The
"System" is omnivorous. Its insatiable maw yawns as greedily for the
ten-cent pieces of the people as for the thousands of the larger
investor. It is as avid and relentless in devising ant-traps as
elephant-snares. There fell into my hands recently certain valuable
documents in the meanest of contemporary swindles, which reveal the
connection of the National City Bank, certain of its officers and other
important financial interests, with a plot to fleece the fag ends of the
public. The details of the Munroe & Munroe-Montreal & Boston conspiracy
have been widely published, and the world is well acquainted now with
the two Munroes, graduates of a "gents' furnishing-goods" shop in
Montreal, introduced into high finance in New York, organizing with the
assistance of the great Rockefeller-Stillman-Rogers bank a copper
corporation with shares at a par value of five dollars. There never was
such barefaced exploitation as was used on behalf of this proposition.
It was advertised as a bonanza; investors were guaranteed against loss
by an assurance that their stock would double and treble in price, and
that the company would stand ready at all times to buy back shares at
cost. The intention was plainly to entice into the Montreal & Boston
people of very limited means, who could ill afford to lose their
savings.

The sudden panic, brought about by the warning to the people of the
traps that were being set for them, caught napping many of the
"System's" votaries, large and small, and before they could get their
different devices even-keeled from the shock caused by that single blast
of truth, the public got a peep 'tween decks into the machinery. Among
those whose port-holes were blown wide open was the Munroe & Munroe-City
Bank-Montreal & Boston outfit, whose scheme went down like a card-house
in the blow. A receiver was at once appointed to take care of the
debris. This mishap revealed an amazing condition of affairs. With only
$2,000 capital, Munroe & Munroe had arranged with the gre