ntial silliness.

When his brokers appeared at ten the next morning, he drove them from
the house, and then, with such wits as he could muster, in a head still
tortured by his night's excesses, thought over his situation. A heavy
slice of his ready money had been practically swept out of existence. If
he was not crippled, his wings were clipped. His prestige was departed.
He knew that men would thereafter be wary of following him, or trusting
to his sagacity. Beyond the power of his money, and his power to make
money, he knew that he had no consideration on 'Change--that there were
five hundred men who would laugh to see the General go down--who had
less feeling for him, personally, than they entertained toward an
ordinary dog. He knew this because so far, at least, he understood
himself. To redeem his position was now the grand desideratum. He would
do it or die!

There was one direction in which the General had permitted himself to be
shortened in, or, rather, one in which he had voluntarily crippled
himself for a consideration. He had felt himself obliged to hold large
quantities of the stock of the Crooked Valley Railroad, in order to
maintain his seat at the head of its management. He had parted with
comparatively little of it since his first huge purchase secured the
place he sought, and though the price he gave was small, the quantity
raised the aggregate to a large figure. All this was unproductive. It
simply secured his place and his influence.

No sooner had he thoroughly realized the great loss he had met with, in
connection with his Wall street conspiracy, than he began to revolve in
his mind a scheme which he had held in reserve from the first moment of
his control of the Crooked Valley Road. He had nourished in every
possible way the good-will of those who lived along the line. Not only
this, but he had endeavored to show his power to do anything he pleased
with the stock.

The people believed that he only needed to raise a finger to carry up
the price of the stock in the market, and that the same potent finger
could carry it down at will. He had already wrought wonders. He had
raised a dead road to life. He had invigorated business in every town
through which it passed. He was a king, whose word was law and whose
will was destiny. The rumors of his reverses in Wall street did not
reach them, and all believed that, in one way or another, their fortunes
were united with his.

The scheme to which he re