ladder to get it down. Out squalls a ticket-carrier, 'Done at 7/8;'
again, 'At 3/4, all a-going;' and the contractors must go, too; they
have served the commissioners at 69, when the market was full
one-eighth. All must come to market before next omnium payment; they
cannot keep it up (yet this operation might have suited the positions of
the market). Nathan cries out, 'Where done at 3/4ths?' 'Here--there,
there, there!' Mr. Doubleface, going out at the door, meets Mr. Ambush,
a brother bear, with a wink, 'Sir, they are 3/4ths, I believe, sellers;
you may have L2,000 thereat, and L10,000 at 5/8ths.' This is called
fiddling: it is allowable to jobbers thus to bring the turn to 1/16th,
or a 32nd, but not to brokers, as thereby the public would not be
fleeced 1/8th, to the house benefit. 'Sir, I would not take them at
1/4th,' replies Mr. Ambush. 'Offered at 3/4ths and 5/8ths,' bawls out an
urchin scout, holding up his face to the ceiling, that by the re-echo
his spot may not be discovered."

The system of business at the Stock Exchange is thus described by an
accomplished writer on the subject: "Bargains are made in the presence
of a third person. The terms are simply entered in a pocket-book, but
are checked the next day; and the jobber's clerk (also a member of the
house) pays or receives the money, and sees that the securities are
correct. There are but three or four dealers in Exchequer bills. Most
members of the Stock Exchange keep their money in convertible
securities, so that it can be changed from hand to hand almost at a
moment's notice. The brokers execute the orders of bankers, merchants,
and private individuals; and the jobbers are the persons with whom they
deal. When the broker appears in the market, he is at once surrounded by
eager jobbers. One of the cries of the Stock Exchange is, 'Borrow money?
borrow money?'--a singular cry to general apprehension, but it of course
implies that the credit of the borrower must be first-rate, or his
security of the most satisfactory nature, and that it is not the
principal who goes into the market, but only the principal's broker.
'Have you money to lend to-day?' is a startling question often asked
with perfect _nonchalance_ in the Stock Exchange. If the answer is
'Yes,' the borrower says, 'I want L10,000 or L20,000.'--'At what
security?' is the vital question that soon follows.

"Another mode of doing business is to conceal the object of the borrower
or lender, who ask