“Auntie,” replied Mr. Bang with mock gravity, (I assume it was affected, though it seemed so real) “I’m afraid you stick to the respectable at any and every cost. This is the great Canadian tendency.” Turning to me, he continued, (and I put down his words as I am able, for I am not used to the phrases of the market, but I think I have it). “According to Mr. Timkins, the tendency people have to cater to the respectable is played upon by those who sell stocks. A purchaser comes to a broker with money he wishes to employ. Nine times out of ten he is a buyer and probably names an issue or two that have suggested themselves to him. Nine times out of ten, the broker has special affiliations, so he hedges the customer about with one objection after another, until he has him on the path he wishes. In this process, if all else fails, the broker intimates that the course the customer would pursue would be gambling, shrugs his shoulders and leaves the old reliable spirit of respectability to do the rest.”
“And—the rest?” asked Uncle.
“Is that the customer buys what the broker wishes him to buy—and loses.”
“Always?” asked Mumsie. “You are much too positive, Jack.”
“Well, Auntie, I think I’m justified. People who follow the advice of those so-called brokers lose nineteen times out of twenty; statistics show it.”
“Why ‘so-called’ brokers?”
“Because the term broker means one who buys and sells on commission, but many of our brokers are really what in England is called a jobber, who speculate for themselves and underwriters.
“And your friend Mr. Timkins?”
“Plays a lone hand and wins. He is the twentieth or the hundredth, as the case may be.”
“I don’t think that is a very respectable way to make money,” objected Mumsie.