At that time my alliance with "Standard Oil" was close. A business connection had developed into a strong personal relation between Mr. Rogers and myself. We were engaged, together with William Rockefeller, on a great financial deal which was based on certain conclusions I had worked out in regard to the copper industry. These men were to me the embodiment of success, success won in the fiercest commercial conflict of the age. Their position at the helm of the greatest financial institution in the world gave weight and importance to their judgment and opinions. Nor had aught occurred between us to suggest they would dare perpetrate the crimes they did. Besides all this, indeed an integral part of it, my personal resources were completely involved in the transaction, for the most part pledged with Mr. Rogers and William Rockefeller in stocks of the Butte & Boston and Boston & Montana corporations. This was, then, the nature of our connection when Mr. Rogers, suddenly and without previous intimation of his schemes, notified me of his purchase of the Daly-Haggin-Tevis properties, and practically ordered me to put them upon the tray which I was preparing and take them to the eagerly waiting public, who by this time were fairly howling for the good things we had been promising them. In support of this extraordinary change of plan Mr. Rogers urged the secret wealth of the Anaconda and the great value of the other properties which I myself had helped purchase, but I bitterly opposed the new proposition until there was nothing before me but these alternatives--to accept the change Mr. Rogers insisted on or break with "Standard Oil." The latter would mean that I must announce to the public that it was in danger of being tricked, and it was by no means certain that my warning would carry weight against the denials and assurances of "Standard Oil." However much influence I had obtained through my long years of dealings with the public, independent of "Standard Oil," I realized that "Standard Oil's" influence and prestige were much greater, for it must be remembered that at this time the public had not had the evidence since acquired of the "System's" cold-blooded trickery. If I took this course it would mean not only my own ruin financially, for Mr. Rogers and William Rockefeller could call my loans and wipe me out completely, but also the ruin of my friends and allies, who, under my direction, had invested their own millions in the properties concerned. On the other hand, I had the most earnest assurances from Mr. Rogers and William Rockefeller that the new properties were worth much more than the $75,000,000 at which it was proposed to capitalize them. They took me to task for my distrust of them, and went far to demonstrate to me the accuracy of their estimates. They not only gave me Marcus Daly's minute estimates of the values and legitimate possibilities of Anaconda, but consented to have these verified by outside experts in whom I had