ied.

While you've only asked me for money, and not for advice, I may say
that, should you put a question on some general topic like, "What are
the wild waves saying, father?" I should answer, "Keep out of watered
stocks, my son, and wade into your own business a little deeper."
Though, when you come to think of it, these continuous-performance
companies, that let you in for ten, twenty, and thirty cents a share,
ought to be a mighty good thing for investors after they've developed
their oil and gold properties, because a lot of them can afford to pay
10 per cent. before they've developed anything but suckers.

So long as gold-mining with a pen and a little fancy paper continues to
be such a profitable industry, a lot of fellows who write a pretty fair
hand won't see any good reason for swinging a pick. They'll simply pass
the pick over to the fellow who invests, and start a new prospectus.
While the road to Hell is paved with good intentions, they're something
after all; but the walls along the short cuts to Fortune are papered
with only the prospectuses of good intentions--intentions to do the
other fellow good and plenty.

I don't want to question your ability or the purity of your friends'
intentions, but are you sure you know their business as well as they
do? Denver is a lovely city, with a surplus of climate and scenery,
and a lot of people there go home from work every night pushing a
wheelbarrow full of gold in front of them, but at the same time there
is no surplus of _that_ commodity, and most of the fellows who find it
have cut their wisdom teeth on quartz. It isn't reasonable to expect
that you're going to buy gold at fifty cents on the dollar, just
because it hasn't been run through the mint yet.

I simply mention these things in a general way. There are two branches
in the study of riches--getting the money and keeping it from getting
away. When a fellow has saved a thousand dollars, and every nickel
represents a walk home, instead of a ride on a trolley; and every
dollar stands for cigars he didn't smoke and for shows he didn't
see--it naturally seems as if that money, when it's invested, ought to
declare dividends every thirty days. But almost any scheme which
advertises that it will make small investors rich quick is like one of
these Yellowstone geysers that spouts up straight from Hades with a
boom and a roar--it's bound to return to its native brimstone sooner
or later, leaving nothing behind it