At the end of six months we were not twenty pounds richer than
before.
"This will never do," said Bob, as he sat one evening in my rooms
compounding his second tumbler. "I thought we were living in an
enlightened age; but I find I was mistaken. That brutal spirit of
monopoly is still abroad and uncurbed. The principles of free trade are
utterly forgotten, or misunderstood. Else how comes it that David
Spreul received but yesterday an allocation of two hundred shares in the
Westermidden Junction, while your application and mine, for a thousand
each were overlooked? Is this a state of things to be tolerated? Why
should he, with his fifty thousand pounds, receive a slapping premium,
while our three hundred of available capital remains unrepresented? The
fact is monstrous, and demands the immediate and serious interference of
the legislature."
"It is a burning shame," said I, fully alive to the manifold advantages
of a premium.
"I'll tell you what, Dunshunner," rejoined M'Corkindale, "it's no use
going on in this way. We haven't shown half pluck enough. These fellows
consider us as snobs because we don't take the bull by the horns.
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