One inevitable evil attending all forms of commercial prosperity is that they are built up in so large a degree upon a basis of unremunerative speculation. Such a foundation only serves as a sufficient support to the superstructure, while the pressure upon it does not pass a certain limit. If, for example, it be accepted as proved that one Stock Exchange transaction in twenty is _bona fide_, it is obvious that when the speculation in those markets shrinks up for the time, which it is sure to do when it has had its run, a number of stock brokers whose business has been established by reason of the increase of speculative operations must fail, unless they have made enough money during the period of unusual activity to be able to live through the period of stagnation that intervenes before the next revival. And after every commercial revulsion a large number of them do fail, and it is not easy to estimate the mischief that is occasioned by the shock that is communicated to trade and production by the sudden and complete stoppage of these extra streams of expenditure. [Sidenote: THE INFLUENCE OF TRADE PROFITS UPON THE STOCK MARKETS.] There are great foci whence proceed currents of profit. The currents of profit may be traced to the great seats of the national industries. The money made, for example, by the great cotton and iron manufacturers of this country, distributes itself in a hundred streams from Lancashire and Yorkshire, to keep within the bounds of two counties.[28] The larger currents flow into the pockets of two classes, those who are very rich, and those who are moderately so; while the smaller streams trickle into the cottages of the labourer and artisan. The wealthy direct their new gains as they flow in, into the markets for public securities, and the gains of the labourers follow to some extent in the same direction at a slower pace, through the lower middle class, whose profits increase by the augmented consumption of all the primary articles, in which weekly wages are laid out. In both cases the currents of profit starting from the great foci of production, spread, embracing all classes of the community, like the winter’s snows gathered in their wealth in the mountain heights, which are loosened by the summer sun to flow over and irrigate the grateful plains below, and are again gathered up to a large extent for distribution through the Stock Exchanges of Europe. [Sidenote: AN INCREASE IN THE AMOUNT OF TRADE PROFITS REALISED, CAUSES AN INCREASE IN THE NUMBER OF SECURITIES.]