An issue of collateral bonds, a reduction in the Lehigh rental, a funding of coupons, and a voting trust: these were the propositions which President Harris and his associates presented for the consideration of the bondholders. There was to be no disturbance of existing securities, no assessment, not even a reduction of fixed charges except as these were lightened by the lowering of rentals and by the payment of the floating debt. It is to be presumed that the attempt to extend the Reading into New England was not to be continued, for no provision was made for the purchase of the shares of the New England roads hitherto held on margin, and in fact large sales of Boston & Maine stock had already taken place; but no formal mention of the deal was made. The lease of the Lehigh Valley was to be continued in the hope of better times, while the reduction of rental which the plan required had already taken place. Under ordinary circumstances any plan such as the one outlined would have been quite futile. Where the failure of a road is due to deep-seated causes the remedy must be fundamental; and when a piling up of indebtedness is due to inability to pay fixed charges the situation must be met by a reduction of those charges even though a foreclosure sale be a necessary preliminary. In the present case matters were somewhat different: bankruptcy had come, not from a long-continued drain, but from a rapid diffusion of resources in an attempt to accomplish more than the finances of the road would permit; and a change of policy was the thing most urgently required. But this again was not a question with which a reorganization plan had to deal, except in so far as such a plan might smooth the difficulties which lay in the way; and any scheme which should restore to the company the collateral imperilled in its rash campaign, fund the floating debt at a reasonable rate of interest, and give the management a chance to start again, was worthy of serious consideration. It may be observed, however, that granting all of the above, the plan before us did not go far enough. The extensions due to President McLeod had been in the heart of the coal regions, as well as in New England, and one of the most important of these, the Lehigh Valley, the managers proposed to retain. This policy, it may be said, was of very doubtful wisdom. The attempt to monopolize the production of anthracite coal had already been fruitful of disaster, and the possession of the Lehigh would have constituted a continual temptation to future purchases; while it was far from certain that even under the reduced rental the road could have been made to pay. What the Reading needed was a period of quiet attention to its own business, undisturbed by meddling in the business of other people; an attention which would be sure to result in increased economies, and was the true remedy for the lack of prosperity in the coal industry which had driven Mr. McLeod on his wild career. It