- Twenty-seven Miscellaneous Companies,
Including
- A London Brick Company,
- A Patent Brick Company,
- A London Marine Bath Company,
- A Royal National Bath Company,
- A Great Westminster Milk Company,
and
- A Metropolitan Water Company.
- An Alderney Dairy Company,
- A Metropolitan Alderney Dairy Company,
- A South London Milk Company,
- An East London Milk Company,
- A Metropolitan Milk Company.
A correspondent in the “London Magazine” declares, that “if we named the several divisions of the year after the French revolutionary fashion, by the phenomena observable in them, we should, from our experience of January, 1825, call it Bubblose—it has been a month of most flagitious and flourishing knavery.” He pleasantly assumes that Mr. Jeremiah Hop-the-twig, attorney at law, benevolently conceives the idea of directing “surplus capital” to the formation of “a joint stock company for the outfit of air-balloons, the purchase of herds of swine, and the other requisites for a flourishing lunar commerce; Capital One Million, divided into 10,000 shares of 100l. each.” The method is then related of opening an account with a respectable banking-house, obtaining respectable directors, appointing his son-in-law the respectable secretary, the son of a respected director the respectable standing counsel, and the self-nomination of the respectable Mr. Jeremiah H. and Co. as the respectable solicitors. Afterwards come the means of raising the bubble, to the admiration of proper persons who pay a deposit of 5l. per share; who, when the shares “look down,” try to sell, but there are “no buyers,” the “quotations are nominal;” a second instalment called for, the holders hesitate; “their shares are forfeited;” the speculation is consequently declared frustrated; and there being only £10,000 in the bankers’ hands to pay “Mr. Hop-the-twig’s bill of 10,073l. 13s. 4d. that respectable solicitor is defrauded of the sum of 73l. 13s. 4d. This is the rise and fall of a respectable bubble.”
Undoubtedly, among these various schemes afloat, some will be productive of great benefit to the country; but it is seriously to be considered whether the estimation of some of them in a money view be not too high, and forced to an undue price by the arts of jobbing:
Haste instantly and buy, cries one
Real Del Monte shares, for none
Will hold a richer profit;
Another cries—No mining plan
Like ours—the Anglo-Mexican
As for Del Monte, scoff it.
This grasps my button, and declares
There’s nothing like Columbian shares,
The capital a million;—
That, cries La Plata’s sure to pay;
Or bids me buy without delay
Hibernian or Brazilian.
’Scaped from the torments of the mine
Rivals in Gas, an endless line,
Arrest me as I travel;
Each sure my suffrage to receive,
If I will only give him leave,
His project to unravel.