Another kind of bait offered is that of the "prominent name." This has proved more useful in England than in this country. Whittaker Wright was able to secure members of the nobility for his boards of directors, and the English public swallowed his schemes one after another, bait, hook, bob, and sinker. In this country we have no lords whom we dearly love, so the names of prominent literary or scientific men sometimes are employed by wise promoters. A "prominent mining expert" is excellent bait. Some good men have been used in this way, and the bait of their reputation in other lines of activity has served to make ignorant and innocent people of small means swallow the hook hid in the lying statements which they have perhaps innocently, certainly ignorantly, fathered. We are all familiar with the literature of this class, sent to us under the guise of personal and intimate confidence. Always that part of the communication is followed by the blackfaced type where the stinger lies concealed. The words AT ONCE usually come in capitals, as do LAST CHANCE, and PRICE POSITIVELY WILL ADVANCE AFTER TEN DAYS. Millions and millions of dollars have been extracted from the public by these means. There is no law against it.
"ADJOINING" MINES—GOOD BAIT
Then there is the same old argument about wonderful properties "adjoining" such and such a dividend-paying property. Very often the properties are miles apart. They might be within twenty-five feet of each other, and one still might be worthless and the other rich. The profits of old and famous properties very frequently are given in advertising literature of this class, "to show what money there is in mining." The "property" sold may be a ten-foot hole in a sand-bank two thousand miles from any of these; yet this absurd argument is sufficient to extract coin from the pocket of the American buyer. You can use Michigan to tout him on to Arizona; Utah to land him in California; Mexico to interest him in Alaska. Is it not true? There is no law against it.
Again, the appeal to your mining pocket may come, not through the advertising page, but in the proper person of the promoter or owner himself. For instance, not long ago a gentleman from California came into my office. He owned a mine on the old and well-traced Mother Vein, of Tuolumne County, California. It had been well opened, and showed, in development, according to a reputable engineer's report, three million dollars' worth of ore in sight, with many tons of the best ore already in the dump, stuff which would run very high in value.
At the proper time the gentleman carefully produced from his pocket a little ingot of pure gold, product of one test-mill run. He gave the best of references as to his responsibility. He offered to guarantee ten per cent. dividends on all money invested, and declared that he had a banking proposition and not a mine.
WHEELBARROW VS. $72,000
"My Christian friend," said I to him, "you seem to have a good thing. How far is it from your mine dump to the nearest bank?"
"About five miles," he answered.
"In that case," said I, "it seems to me you don't need to sell a hundred thousand dollars' worth of stock to build a stamp-mill. You need only enough to buy yourself a good, strong wheelbarrow. In two or three months you can thus build your own stamp-mill and pay for it with ore, and still have your mine all in your own hands."
He could not see it that way, and, pursuing his own method, he took $72,000 in two weeks out of the city of Chicago, from some of the best business men of that city. Now, perhaps he had a real mine. I have no right to doubt that he had; but the point of interest to the small investor is this: NEITHER HAVE I ANY RIGHT TO BELIEVE THAT HE HAD. The thing for me to do, had I wished to invest in this way, would have been to send an expert to see the property personally.