"Exchange-alley sounds no longer of thousands got in an instant; but, on the contrary, all corners of the town are filled with the groans of the afflicted; and they who lately rode in great state to that famous mart of money, now condescend to walk the streets on foot, and, instead of adding to their equipages, have at once lost their estates. And even those of the trading rank who talked loudly of retiring into the country, purchasing estates, there building fine houses, and in every thing imitating their betters, are now become bankrupts, and have, by necessity, shut up their shops, because they could not keep them open any longer; however, for the comfort of such whose condition will admit of a remedy, it is said, a gentleman has formed a scheme for the relief of those concerned."
Mist's Journal contains a paragraph, said to have been copied from a work, intituled, "The Lord knows what, by the Lord knows who;" which seems to place the South-Sea Stock in a true light: "I shall make a familiar simile, which every reader may carry in his mind without the help of figures, and which, I think, has a very near resemblance to the South-Sea scheme, as it has been executed: viz. A, having 100l. Stock in Trade, though pretty much in debt, gives it out to be worth 300l. on account of many privileges and advantages to which he is entitled. B, relying on his great wisdom and integrity, sues to be admitted a partner on those terms, and accordingly brings 300l. into the partnership. The trade being afterwards given out or discovered to be very improving, C comes in at 500l.; and afterwards D, at 1100l.; and the capital is then completed to 2000l. If the partnership had gone on no farther than A and B, then A had got and B had lost 100l.; if it had stopt at C, A had got and C had lost 200l.; and B had been as he was before. But D also coming in, A gains 400l. and B 200l. and C neither gains nor loses, but D loses 600l. Indeed, if A could show that the said capital was intrinsically worth 4,400l., there would be no harm done to D, and B and C would have been much obliged to him. But if the capital at first was worth but 100l. and increased only by the subsequent partnerships, it must then
be acknowledged that B and C have been imposed on in their turns; and that unfortunate, thoughtless D pays the piper."
I shall conclude my notices of the money-making schemes of 1720, with a beautiful invocation written by Mr. Philips: "O Eunomius (Earl Cowper), oraculous in thy speech! happy had it been for thy country if thy wisdom and integrity could have prevailed over the rashness of some, and the avarice of others! Hereafter may'st thou never speak in vain; and may thy counsels help to remedy those evils they might have prevented! may the King hasten his return to his deluded, abused subjects, and the Council of the Nation be speedily summoned for the redress of the land! In the mean time let us mutually bear with, and assist one another in our present necessities: and since we are as free, though not so rich, a people as we have been; and still claim, as our birthright, the liberty to debate, to speak, to write manfully for the public good; let us not be dejected like our neighbours, after whose inventions we have gone astray, not sorrow, even as others who have no hope.
"Have we been delivered from the curse of arbitrary power; have we been preserved from the destruction of the sword, the rage of fire, the scourge of pestilence, and the ghastly terrors of famine, to suffer by the mean artifices of money-changers? O my fellow citizens, you have joined
with the spoilers; yet have you not added to your stores. Let me print the remembrance of your past inadvertency upon your hearts, that it may abide as a memorial to you and to your children; that deceivers may not hereafter inherit your possessions. And whereunto shall I liken our past inadvertency, that it may abide as a memorial to us and to our children? O my fellow-citizens, we have waged a civil war throughout the land; who hath not committed hostilities against his neighbour, and what hath it profited? The wealth, the inheritance of the Island, are transferred to the meanest of the people; those chiefly have gained who had nothing to lose: the nobility, the gentry, the merchants, have been a prey to the idle, the licentious, the spendthrifts; men whose habitations were not known. All the calamities have we felt of a civil war, bloodshed only excepted: they who abounded suffer want. The industry, the trade of the Nation, has been suspended, and even arts and sciences have languished in the general confusion: the very women have been exposed to plunder, whose condition is the more deplorable, because they are not acquainted with the methods of gain to repair their broken fortunes. Some are driven from their country, others forced into confinement, some are weary of life; and others there are who can neither be comforted nor recovered to the use of reason. Had his Majesty been present to see the wild
proceedings of the people, his goodness would have saved us from these extremities; for though a King can, in his absence, delegate his power and authority, yet can he not delegate his wisdom and his justice."
Immediately after the disclosure of the shocking villainy practised by Stock-jobbers and the South-Sea Directors, another impostor was exposed to public view, and the Charity that had voluntarily flown into his pockets turned to more worthy channels. It is true, the fellow was a little villain, but his arts may serve as a beacon to the unwary. This wretch pretended to be subject to epileptic fits, and would fall purposely into some dirty pool, whence he never failed to be conveyed to a dry place, or to receive handsome donations; sometimes he terrified the spectators with frightful gestures and convulsive motions, as if he would beat his head and limbs to pieces, and, gradually recovering, receive the rewards of his performance; but the frequency of the exploit at length attracted the notice of the Police, by whom he was conveyed in a dreadful fit to the Lord Mayor, in whose presence the symptoms continued with the utmost violence; that respectable Magistrate, undertaking the office of physician, prescribed the Compter, and finally the Workhouse, where he had no sooner arrived, than, finding it useless to counterfeit, he began to amend, and beat his hemp with double earnestness.
A brother in iniquity went to as many as twenty taverns in one afternoon, the landlords of which were ordered by him to prepare a supper for three officers of the guards, and to pay him a shilling for his trouble, and charge it to the officers.
The following Report of a Committee was made to his Majesty's Justices of the Peace for the County of Middlesex, in their General Quarter Sessions, assembled 1725.