_Wholesale Jobbing.—Insurance on Sick Men.—False Intelligence.—Uselessness of Sir John Barnard’s Act.—Origin of the Blackboard.—Opposition to Loans.—Lord Chatham’s Opinion of Jobbers.—Inviolability of English Funds.—Parisian Banking-Houses.—Proposition to pay off the National Debt.—Extravagance of the Contractors.—Lord George Gordon’s Opinion of them.—Members’ Contracts.—New System adopted.—Abraham Goldsmid.—Bankers’ Coalition broken by him.—His Munificence.—His Death.—Sensation in the City._ 54 CHAPTER X. _Curious Forgery.—Its Discovery.—Loan of 1796.—Its Management.—French Revolution and its Effect.—List of Subsidies to Foreign Powers.—Removal of Business from ’Change Alley.—Erection of the present Stock Exchange.—Loyalty Loan.—Preliminaries of Peace.—Its Effect.—Hoax on the Stock Exchange.—War renewed.—Great Fraud on the Jobbers.—Its Discovery.—Rights of Stock-brokers._ 62 CHAPTER XI. _Unfounded Charge.—Joint-Stock Companies.—Speculators.—Mark Sprot.—Sketch of the House of Baring.—Policies on the Life of Bonaparte.—Rumors of his Death.—David Ricardo.—Forgery of Benjamin Walsh.—Excitement of the Nation.—Increase of the National Debt.—Sinking Fund.—Unclaimed Dividends.—Francis Baily._ 72 CHAPTER XII. _Review of the National Debt.—Opinions.—Bolingbroke.—Financial Reform Association.—Extravagance of Government.—Schemes for paying off the National Debt.—Review of them.—Proposals for Debentures._ 82 CHAPTER XIII. _Progress of Invention.—Public Roads.—Steam.—Duke of Bridgewater.—Canals.—Railroads.—Thomas Gray, their Pioneer.—His Difficulties.—Proposals for the Liverpool and Manchester Railway.—Monopoly of the Canals.—Parliamentary Inquiry.—Extraordinary Opinions of Witnesses.—The Claims of Thomas Gray.—Value of Canal Property._ 89 CHAPTER XIV. _Monetary Excitement.—Approaches to the Stock Exchange.—Gold Company.—Equitable Loan Company.—Frauds in Companies.—Loan to Foreign States.—Poyais Bubble._ 96 CHAPTER XV. _Loan to Guatemala.—Dispute concerning it.—Greek Loan.—Its Mismanagement.—Asserted Jobbing.—Mr. Hume.—Dr. Bowring.—Quarterly Review.—Proposed Tax on Transfers._ 103 CHAPTER XVI. _Sketch of the Life of Rothschild.—Comes to England.—Introduction of Foreign Loans.—Large Purchases.—Anecdotes Concerning Rothschild.—His Difficulties and Annoyances.—His Death and Burial.—Last Crisis on the Stock Exchange._ 109 CHAPTER XVII.