oan. As it had been forty years in default on a loan which only
involved a charge of L1632, it is hard to imagine how the State could
have entered into such a liability, or how any issuing house could have
had the temerity to put it before the public.

The public was the only party to the proceedings which showed any sense.
Don C---- G----, representative of the Honduras Government in London,
relates in the record of these events that he put before the Committee,
that "the First Honduras Loan in spite of all the advantages which it
offered to subscribers" [issue price, 80, interest 10 per cent., sinking
fund of 3 per cent, which would redeem the whole loan at par within 17
years] "and the high respectability of the house which managed the
operation, was received by the public with perfect indifference, with
profound contempt; and according to the deficient and vague information
which reached the Legation, there were hardly any other subscriptions
than one of about L10,000 made by the firm of B----itself," Don G----,
however, seems to have slightly exaggerated the wisdom of the public; in
any case the Committee found that by June 30, 1868, by some means
L48,000 of the loan was held by the public, and L952,000 was in
possession of the representatives of the Honduras Government. On that
day a Mr. L---- undertook to take over the Government's holding at L68
12s. per bond, and pay current interest. A market was made, brokers were
prevailed on to interest their friends in the security, and in two
years' time the bonds were disposed of. The quotation was skilfully kept
above the issue price and in November, 1868, it reached 94.

The story of this loan is complicated by the fact that half of it was at
the time alleged to have been placed in Paris, but it appears, as far as
one can disentangle fact from the twisted skein of the report, that the
Paris placing must have resulted much as did the first effort made in
London, and that practically the whole of the bonds there issued came
back into the hands of the representatives of Honduras.

At the end of the proceedings the whole amount of the loan seemed to
have been disposed of in London, L631,000 having been sold to Mr. L----
and passed on by him by the means described above, L200,000 having been
issued to railway contractors, L10,800 having been "drawn before issue
and cancelled," while L49,500 was "issued in exchange for scrip," and
L108,500 was taken on account of commission