There were, on the other hand, indications from the beginning that the Spreckels group did not intend to commit itself to the permanent management of a railroad system, but that they regarded connection with, and perhaps amalgamation between, the San Francisco and San Joaquin Valley and the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fé as the natural culmination of the former road’s career. Like Stanford, Mark Hopkins, Huntington, and Crocker, Claus Spreckels, his sons, and the persons most intimately associated with them were not originally railroad men, and were not, when they began railroad construction, particularly interested in the railroad business as a business. They were therefore to be tempted to continue railroad management only by a chance for extraordinary profits—a chance which the San Francisco and San Joaquin Valley Railway did not offer. Looking at the matter from a business standpoint, it is not unreasonable to suppose that they saw that the best opportunity for withdrawing their capital from the valley speculation lay in negotiations with the Santa Fé. Of course this is surmise, and perhaps is mainly plausible as a late interpretation of happenings which we know took place, but it has a certain reasonableness in view of all the facts. The concrete evidence that combination between the San Francisco and San Joaquin Valley and the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fé was looked upon as a possibility from the first, is to be found in the provisions of the trust agreement entered into by subscribers to the San Francisco and San Joaquin Valley Railway stock, and in the negotiations between that railroad and the city of San Francisco and the state government of California, over what was known as the China Basin lease. Trust Agreement Soon after the promoters of the San Francisco and San Joaquin Valley Railway had successfully organized their corporation, subscribers to the stock of the company were asked to enter into a certain trust agreement or pooling plan designed primarily to prevent the railroad from falling into the hands of the Southern Pacific. Briefly summarized, this plan contemplated the transfer of the stock of the company to seven (later nine) trustees. Individual stockholders so transferring their holdings were to receive trust certificates clothing them with the powers and privileges usual in such cases. The trustees on their part were to administer the railway for a period of ten years unless three-quarters of the certificate holders should request an earlier termination of the trust, or unless all of the subscribers should die.