Every thing which could inflate the hopes of the schemer was brought into operation by the brokers. If shares were dull, they jobbed in the funds, or tried exchequer bills; and if these failed, rather than remain idle, they dealt in bank-notes at 40 per cent. discount. These new modes of gambling seized upon the town with a violence which sober citizens could scarcely understand. Their first impulse was to laugh at the stories currently circulated of fortunes lost and won; but when they saw men who were yesterday threadbare pass them to-day in their carriages,—when they saw wealth, which it took their plodding industry years of patient labor to acquire, won by others in a few weeks,—unable to resist the temptation, the greatest of the city merchants deserted their regular vocations and speculated in the newly-produced stocks. “The poor English nation,” says a writer, “run a madding after new inventions, whims, and projects; and this unhappy ingredient my dear countrymen have in their temper,—they are violent, and prosecute their projects eagerly.” No sooner had the members of the jobbing community taken their quarter in ’Change Alley, than the city of London was seized with alarm, and tried to keep the brokers at the Royal Exchange. They grew indignant at their deserting so time-honored a place, and bound them in pains and penalties not to appear in ’Change Alley. Pocket, however, triumphed over prerogative; brokers resorted where bargains were plentiful; ’Change Alley grew famous throughout England; but it was not till nearly a century and a quarter after its first transaction, and a quarter of a century after ’Change Alley ceased to exist as a sphere for the stock-jobbers, that the ancient and useless provision not to assemble in ’Change Alley was expunged from the broker’s bond.