Gould was now fairly on the way toward his colossal fortune. Though friends warned him against entering into the whirlpool of blasted hopes and ruined fortunes of Wall street, his inclinations in that direction were too strong to be resisted. Gould was a born speculator. It is true that his great fortune was created mainly in hazardous enterprises outside of Wall street, and that in stock speculations, pure and simple, he was not always so successful or so infallible as many have supposed, but by nature and habit Gould was at this time of his life a commercial gambler, and it was as natural that he should enter Wall street as for a duck to take to water. It was in 1859 or 1860 that Gould first entered Wall street. It was not very long before he stepped to the front rank. What a long list of brainy and courageous men do Gould’s contemporaries in the street make! With most of them Gould has been at sword’s point, with a few he has been an ally, with some he has been both ally and enemy. Most of them are no longer powers in the speculative world. Some of them are dead. Not a few have been overwhelmed in the swift, resistless torrent of stock speculation. Three or four yet remain with power in their hands and millions in their vaults. The Vanderbilts--the commodore, his son and grandsons--Daniel Drew, James Fisk, Jr., the Beldens, Commodore Garrison, Henry N. Smith, James R. Keene, William Heath, George I. Seney, Gen. Thomas, Calvin S. Brice, D. O. Mills, Horace F. Clark, Alfred Sully, Addison Cammack, C. F. Woerishoffer, the Rockefellers, S. M. Kneeland, C. J. Osborn, D. P. Morgan, H. S. Ives, C. P. Huntington, Russell Sage, Cyrus W. Field, John W. Garrett, Robert Garrett, J. P. Morgan, the Seligmans, Brown Bros., Jay Cooke, Hugh J. Jewett, Lathrop, Little and Austin Corbin, Henry Clews, Washington E. Connor, Burnham, Gen. E. F. Winslow, Edward S. Stokes, S. V. White, William Dowd, Solon Humphreys, William R. Travers, Rufus Hatch, Samuel Sloan--these were some of the men identified with various Wall street interests with whom Gould has been allied or at enmity, or both, during his long career in the street. That he has been able among all these financial giants to make himself the leader is the highest evidence that can be given of his genius in speculation and railroad financiering. As we read some of these names there arise before our eyes the visions of murder, of suicide, of bankruptcy, of the debtor’s prison, of the felon’s cell, of ruined fortunes and blasted reputations. Others of the men have achieved wealth and honorable names. It is interesting to note that at the time Gould first entered the street one of his fellow-boarders at the Everett House was James Gordon Bennett, the elder, with whose son and successor he became engaged in such bitter business and personal antagonisms.