dollar. I laid the matter
before Mr. Thomson and suggested an exchange, which that company was
only too glad to make, as it saved one per cent interest on the bonds.
I sailed at once for London with the control of five millions of first
mortgage Philadelphia and Erie Bonds, guaranteed by the Pennsylvania
Railroad Company--a magnificent security for which I wanted a high
price. And here comes in one of the greatest of the hits and misses of
my financial life.

I wrote the Barings from Queenstown that I had for sale a security
which even their house might unhesitatingly consider. On my arrival in
London I found at the hotel a note from them requesting me to call. I
did so the next morning, and before I had left their banking house I
had closed an agreement by which they were to bring out this loan, and
that until they sold the bonds at par, less their two and a half per
cent commission, they would advance the Pennsylvania Railroad Company
four millions of dollars at five per cent interest. The sale left me a
clear profit of more than half a million dollars.

The papers were ordered to be drawn up, but as I was leaving Mr.
Russell Sturgis said they had just heard that Mr. Baring himself was
coming up to town in the morning. They had arranged to hold a
"court," and as it would be fitting to lay the transaction before him
as a matter of courtesy they would postpone the signing of the papers
until the morrow. If I would call at two o'clock the transaction would
be closed.

Never shall I forget the oppressed feeling which overcame me as I
stepped out and proceeded to the telegraph office to wire President
Thomson. Something told me that I ought not to do so. I would wait
till to-morrow when I had the contract in my pocket. I walked from the
banking house to the Langham Hotel--four long miles. When I reached
there I found a messenger waiting breathless to hand me a sealed note
from the Barings. Bismarck had locked up a hundred millions in
Magdeburg. The financial world was panic-stricken, and the Barings
begged to say that under the circumstances they could not propose to
Mr. Baring to go on with the matter. There was as much chance that I
should be struck by lightning on my way home as that an arrangement
agreed to by the Barings should be broken. And yet it was. It was too
great a blow to produce anything like irritation or indignation. I was
meek enough to be quite resigned, and merely congratulated myself that
I had no