The Wall Street patriots never miss an opportunity to remind us with great show of pride that they “furnished the money with which to carry on the Civil War.” They did furnish a good deal of money, and like true patriotic Shylocks they took blood-sealed, interest-bearing bonds in exchange for their cash. On every possible occasion the bonds were _bought at such a sacrifice price as to almost bleed the nation to death in the presence of its enemies_. Dr. H. C. Adams (University of Michigan, Department of Finance) says:[137] That, “estimated on the average price of gold,” the Federal Government, “for the forty-five months of the Civil War” realized from public obligations of all sorts less than 67 per cent. That is to say, certain bloodless patriots’ lack of faith and their desire also to “push a good thing” and take at least a “full pound of flesh”—resulted in their dear Government’s loss of blood in its financial transactions to the extent of more than 33 per cent. This disastrous shrinkage was due unquestionably in a very large measure to the bankers’ manipulation of the Government’s financial affairs for their own private benefit. These glittering Shylocks were beautifully, even prayerfully, enthusiastic in their hand-clapping for their dear country’s welfare; and yet they showed almost perfect emotional self-control. Mr. Lincoln hated their gold-lust “patriotism,” but he was compelled to bow low before their power. The lovingly patriotic embrace which our country received from the bond-leech capitalists during the Civil War clearly revealed their amiable intention to bleed their country just as nearly to death as possible—and yet not _kill_ it lest the precious goose should cease to lay such interesting eggs. Your “patriotic” war-bond buyer is a temperamentally calm person. Some citizens bleed for their country, others bleed their country. “Guard against the impostures of patriotism.”—George Washington.[138] Professor J. E. Thorold Rogers[139] states as follows the spirit of much of the argument in the British Parliament, even by many conservatives, concerning the bond-leech patriots who purchased British Napoleonic War bonds: “But we have to endure, in addition to our misfortunes, the sight of the stock-jobbers and fund-holders, who have _fattened on our misery_, and are now receiving more than half our taxes. And for what? We have put down the Corsican usurper, and restored peace to Europe, legitimacy to its thrones. These people [the bondholders] not only get under our funding system at par, stock, with a number of incidental advantages, in exchange for some £50 or less, but they paid [even] this inadequate quota in notes which were constantly at a discount of 30 per cent. _It is intolerable, it is unjust, that we should redeem such stock under the terms of so monstrous and one-sided a bargain._”