, enormous, with a face, his father said, something like that of
a pig; and he wore a high beaver hat and a long frock-coat which hung
loosely about his big chest and stomach. He had managed to force the
price of beef up to thirty cents a pound, causing all the retailers and
consumers to rebel, and this was what made him so conspicuous. He used
to come to the brokerage end of the elder Cowperwood's bank, with as
much as one hundred thousand or two hundred thousand dollars, in twelve
months--post-notes of the United States Bank in denominations of one
thousand, five thousand, and ten thousand dollars. These he would
cash at from ten to twelve per cent. under their face value, having
previously given the United States Bank his own note at four months
for the entire amount. He would take his pay from the Third National
brokerage counter in packages of Virginia, Ohio, and western
Pennsylvania bank-notes at par, because he made his disbursements
principally in those States. The Third National would in the first
place realize a profit of from four to five per cent. on the original
transaction; and as it took the Western bank-notes at a discount, it
also made a profit on those.

There was another man his father talked about--one Francis J. Grund, a
famous newspaper correspondent and lobbyist at Washington, who possessed
the faculty of unearthing secrets of every kind, especially those
relating to financial legislation. The secrets of the President and
the Cabinet, as well as of the Senate and the House of Representatives,
seemed to be open to him. Grund had been about, years before, purchasing
through one or two brokers large amounts of the various kinds of Texas
debt certificates and bonds. The Republic of Texas, in its struggle for
independence from Mexico, had issued bonds and certificates in great
variety, amounting in value to ten or fifteen million dollars. Later,
in connection with the scheme to make Texas a State of the Union, a bill
was passed providing a contribution on the part of the United States of
five million dollars, to be applied to the extinguishment of this old
debt. Grund knew of this, and also of the fact that some of this debt,
owing to the peculiar conditions of issue, was to be paid in full, while
other portions were to be scaled down, and there was to be a false
or pre-arranged failure to pass the bill at one session in order to
frighten off the outsiders who might have heard and begun to buy the old