The receivers’ statement came out in March and announced a floating debt of $18,472,828, against which were held reported assets to the amount of $15,779,784; but of these last $4,985,276 were in the shape of coal, and $8,861,065 consisted of the items “due for freight,” “tolls due from connecting roads,” “bills receivable,” “cash,” etc., a large part of which was probably of little worth. Both the current liabilities and the current assets are instructive, and show that on the one hand Mr. McLeod’s stock operations had involved the company in heavy obligations to his brokers, and that on the other losses in the coal business had necessitated current advances to branch lines from which it was impossible to get return. It appears, for instance, that the Coal & Iron Company had been unable to pay the sums charged it for freight, and while the full amounts had been nevertheless included in reported earnings, the actual result had been a swelling of bills receivable by debts which the Railroad Company was quite unable to collect.[255] The general lines of the policy to be pursued were now sufficiently clear; the more pressing claims were to be met by the issue of receivers’ certificates, expenses were to be cut down, payments under leases were to be amicably reduced where possible, holdings of Boston & Maine stock were to be sold, and on the side of the bondholders the various interests were to agree on some scheme for raising cash and for improving the general condition of the property. There was need for some reduction of fixed charges, but not for such radical cuts as in 1880 or in 1884.