The South Sea Company, after a time, agreed to take upon themselves the whole of the national debt, £30,981,712, about $150,000,000. Sir John Blount, a speculator, first propounded the scheme. It was rumored that Spain, by treaty with England, would grant free trade to all her colonies, and that silver would thus be brought from Potosi, and become as plentiful as iron; and that Mexico would part with gold in abundance for English cotton and woollen goods. It was also said that Spain, in exchange for Gibraltar and Port Mahon, would give up places on the coast of Peru. It was promised that each person who took £100 of stock would make fifty per cent, and probably much more. Mr. Guy took £45,500 of stock, probably the amount which the government owed him for seamen's tickets. Others who had claims "were empowered to subscribe the several sums due to them ... for which he and the rest of the subscribers were to receive an annual interest of six per cent upon their respective subscriptions, until the same were discharged by Parliament." The speculating mania spread widely. Great ladies pawned their jewels in order to invest. Lords were eager to double and treble their money. A journalist of the time writes: "The South Sea equipages increase daily; the city ladies buy South Sea jewels, hire South Sea maids, take new country South Sea houses; the gentlemen set up South Sea coaches, and buy South Sea estates." The people seemed wild with speculation. All sorts of companies were established; one with ten million dollars capital to import walnut-trees from Virginia; one with five million dollars capital for a "wheel for perpetual motion." An unknown adventurer started "a company for carrying on an undertaking of great advantage, but nobody to know what it is." Next morning this great man opened an office in Cornhill, and before three o'clock one thousand shares had been subscribed for at ten dollars a share, and the deposits paid. He put the ten thousand dollars in his pocket, set off the same evening for the Continent, and was never heard of again. He had assured them that nobody would know what the undertaking was, and he had kept his word.