The fact that he had been introduced to me by an official of the bank led me to investigate him no further, but when he attempted to get the company's funds and its stock in blank I started an investigation, and found that the house that he was living in, and the horses and carriages, had been secured from another unsuspecting individual much older than myself in much the same manner. This individual had been in business for many years, nevertheless the promoter induced him to reorganize his successful business on a much larger capitalization. The promoter made an agreement with this man to sell the stock of the new company, and promised he would interest his friends, the Astors, Goulds, and Vanderbilts. As a partial consideration for this he was to receive this mans beautiful home and a certain percentage of the stock. The man's wife having died, he did not care to live longer in the house, so he agreed that the house should be given as a part consideration, and as a guarantee of his delivery of the house and stock as a part consideration on this promoter's agreement to float the stock of the much larger capitalized new company, he had placed both the controlling stock of the company and the house in escrow, and had turned the possession of the house over to this promoter, who was now our general manager, with the deeds of same to be held in escrow and not to be finally recorded until the Goulds, Vanderbilts, Astors, etc., had come into the new company. Hard times occurred about this time, so he claimed, which prevented promised capitalists from coming in, but, as Mr. H---- held the control of the company by holding the control of the stock, he had himself elected an officer of the company at a handsome salary and still held possession of this most beautiful home without ever having paid a dollar. I merely recite this as a warning to inventors to look out for the plausible New York promoter. I also discovered that Mr. H---- had made application for patents, my own patents not yet having been issued, with the idea of getting me into interference in the Patent Office, and it was necessary for us to threaten him with arrest and bring a suit against both himself and the cashier--whom we now learned had known of his previous experiences and expected to share in his profits this time--in order to get a legal release so that we could proceed with the work.