Just as the necessity for extraordinary measures to check the rushing avalanche became imperative, the situation changed a little. There were purchasers for securities of considerable amount at lowest prices. The Broad Street syndicate had begun to take profits, to balance its account. They were compelled to do this. The market had been fearfully oversold. They must buy in some of the stock they had contracted to deliver, for it would be impossible to borrow it. Their purchases checked the panic more effectually than they hoped would happen. Soon they were accepting all stocks that were offered, but the amounts were small. Then they found it necessary to bid fractional advances, but this did not bring out shares in any considerable quantities. The small speculators were quick to take the cue and they began “to realize” also, and they joined in the bidding. A natural reaction set in. Suddenly an astonishing rumor flew through the Exchange. The Assay Office had just received a fresh deposit of ten millions in gold. The Broad Street syndicate was among the first to hear of it. They were dumfounded. Their brokers used extraordinary efforts to accumulate stocks without starting a boom. They met with indifferent success. It was nearly one o’clock and excitement was still high in the Exchange. The real crisis had come. The brokers who had supported the market for two weeks past had taken no part in the wild scene of the last two hours. Most of them had disappeared. Those who were still on the floor had been talking and listening anxiously at telephones or had been writing hurried notes and receiving replies from flying messengers. They did not appear to be men for whom a crash in prices meant ruin, but nobody paid any attention to them amid the mad whirl of events. Now, they suddenly became actors again in the drama. They plunged into the thick of the fight and began bidding up the very stocks in which the bears were trying to cover. It was no longer a defensive campaign on the bull side. It was the most terrifically aggressive one that Wall Street had ever seen. There was no waiting for offers. Bids for shares in any amount were made at recklessly rapid advances in price. There was a wild half-hour which marked an epoch in the history of the New York Stock Exchange. For a few minutes stocks went up point by point, almost as rapidly as they had fallen two hours before. Everybody was amazed. This was no taking of profits after a bear raid. It was a forced advance in which the manipulators of the market squandered fortunes by offering and paying much higher prices than sellers were willing to accept.