overnor, and several directors were brought before them,
and examined rigidly. They found that, at the time these entries were
made, the company was not in possession of such a quantity of stock,
having in their own right only a small quantity, not exceeding thirty
thousand pounds at the utmost. Pursuing the inquiry, they found that this
amount of stock was to be esteemed as taken in or holden by the company
for the benefit of the pretended purchasers, although no mutual agreement
was made for its delivery or acceptance at any certain time. No money was
paid down, nor any deposit or security whatever given to the company by
the supposed purchasers; so that if the stock had fallen, as might have
been expected had the act not passed, they would have sustained no loss.
If, on the contrary, the price of stock advanced (as it actually did by
the success of the scheme), the difference by the advanced price was to be
made good to them. Accordingly, after the passing of the act, the account
of stock was made up and adjusted with Mr. Knight, and the pretended
purchasers were paid the difference out of the company's cash. This
fictitious stock, which had been chiefly at the disposal of Sir John
Blunt, Mr. Gibbon, and Mr. Knight, was distributed among several members
of the government and their connexions, by way of bribe, to facilitate the
passing of the bill. To the Earl of Sunderland was assigned 50,000l. of
this stock; to the Duchess of Kendal, 10,000l.; to the Countess of Platen,
10,000l.; to her two nieces, 10,000l.; to Mr. Secretary Craggs, 30,000l.;
to Mr. Charles Stanhope (one of the secretaries of the Treasury),
10,000l.; to the Sword-blade company, 50,000l. It also appeared that Mr.
Stanhope had received the enormous sum of 250,000l. as the difference in
the price of some stock, through the hands of Turner, Caswall, and Co.,
but that his name had been partly erased from their books, and altered to
Stangape. Aislabie, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, had made profits
still more abominable. He had an account with the same firm, who were also
South-Sea directors, to the amount of 794,451l. He had, besides, advised
the company to make their second subscription one million and a half,
instead of a million, by their own authority, and without any warrant. The
third subscription had been conducted in a manner as disgraceful. Mr.
Aislabie's name was down for 70,000l.; Mr. Craggs, senior, for 659,000l.;
the Earl of Sunderland's for