“This is sworn evidence before a committee of Congress, and its humor is perhaps the more conspicuous because there is every reason to believe that there is not a word of truth in the story from beginning to end. No such interview ever occurred, except in the unconfined apartments of Mr. Fisk’s imagination. His own previous statements make it certain that he was not at Corbin’s house at all that day, and that Corbin did come to the Erie offices that evening and again the next morning. Corbin himself denies the truth of the account without limitation; and adds that when he entered the Erie offices the next morning, Fisk was there. ‘I asked him how Mr. Gould felt after the great calamity of the day before.’ He remarked, ‘Oh, he has no courage at all. He has sunk right down. There is nothing left of him but a heap of clothes and a pair of eyes.’ The internal evidence of truth in this anecdote would support Mr. Corbin against the world. “In regard to Mr. Gould, Fisk’s graphic description was probably again inaccurate. Undoubtedly the noise and scandal of the moment were extremely unpleasant to this silent and impenetrable intriguer. The city was in a ferment, and the whole country pointing at him with wrath. The machinery of the gold exchange had broken down, and he alone could extricate the business community from the pressing danger of a general panic. He had saved himself, it is true; but in a manner which could not have been to his taste. Yet his course from this point must have been almost self-evident to his mind, and there is no reason to suppose that he hesitated.” “His own contracts were all fulfilled. Fisk’s contracts all except one, in respect to which the broker was able to compel a settlement, were repudiated. Gould probably suggested to Fisk that it was better to let Belden fail, and to settle a handsome fortune on him than to sacrifice something more than $5,000,000 in sustaining him. Fisk, therefore, threw Belden over, and swore that he had acted only under Belden’s order. One of the first acts of the Erie gentlemen after the crisis was to summon their lawyers and set in action their judicial powers. The object was to prevent the panic-stricken brokers from using legal process to force settlements and to render the entanglement inextricable. Messrs. Field & Shearman came and instantly prepared a considerable number of injunctions, which were sent to their judges, signed at once, and immediately served. Gould then was able to dictate the terms of settlement, and after a week of complete paralysis, Broad street began at last to show signs of returning life.