Those fine writers might as well have attempted to stop the tide under London-bridge, as to stop the people from buying or subscribing in that Stock: as to the first of these, they know something of what they do, but the Annuitants run blindfold into the hands of the Directors, as if they should say: 'Gentlemen, We have so many 1000_l._ or 100_l. per annum_ in the annuities for 99 years; we know you to be both just and honourable, give us as much of your South-Sea Stock as you please, we oblige ourselves to be content with whatever you shall give us;' and this is, in short, the sum and substance of the case." London Journal, May 7, 1720. The Weekly Packet of the same date adds: "The subscriptions that were lately carried on for raising more millions of money than all Europe can afford, are not as yet quite dead, but are very much withered by the breath of the Senate, or a nipping blast from Westminster. It is observed, that many of those projects are so ridiculous and chimerical, that it is hard to tell which is most to be wondered at, the impudence of those that make the proposals, or the stupid folly of those that subscribe to them; yet many a gudgeon hath been caught in the net, though one would think that, with half an eye, they might discern the cheat. When these bites can no longer go on with their bubbles, happy will be the consequence to many honest but unthinking men that stand in danger to be drawn in by them; but unhappy to themselves that they have been used to such dishonest ways of living, and hardly will take up with any course of life that is not so; insomuch that it is feared, as one says, that many of them will go out a marauding; then stand clear the Bristol Mail." On the 4th of June, the Newspapers intimated the intentions of Parliament, directed to the prevention of any farther mischief from Schemes and Stock-jobbing; and yet, so willing were people to be ruined, that the London Journal of the 11th declares: "The hurry of our Stock-jobbing bubblers, especially, has been so great this week, that it has even exceeded all that ever was known before. The subscriptions are innumerable; and so eager all sorts of people have been to engage in them, how improbable or ridiculous soever they have appeared, that there has been nothing but running about from one Coffee-house to another, and from one Tavern to another, to subscribe, and without examining what the proposals were. The general cry has been, 'For G--'s sake let us but subscribe to something, we do not care what it is!' So that, in short, many have taken them at their words, and entered them adventurers in some of the grossest cheats and improbable undertakings that ever the world heard of: and yet, by all these, the projectors have got money, and have had their subscriptions full as soon as desired."