CHAPTER XVI 



THE GRIP OP THE PIT 



Now, infidel, I have thee on the hip I 



Merchant of Venice. 



THE visitors' gallery is an excellent vantage point 

 from which to view the trading floor of the 

 Exchange. It runs the full width of the south 

 wall. The chairs entrenched behind the rail have 

 acquired a slippery polish from the shiftings of count- 

 less occupants just as the wall behind has known the 

 restless backs of onlookers who have stood for hours at 

 a stretch. 



It is here that the curious foregather good people 

 from every walk of life except the grain business. The 

 tourist who is "just passing through your beautiful 

 city" and has heard that Winnipeg has the largest 

 primary wheat market in the world the tourist drops 

 in to see the sights. Friend Husband is there, pre- 

 tending to be very bored by these things while ful- 

 filling his promise to take Friend Wife "some day 

 when there's something doing." Young girls who only 

 know that bulls hate anything red and that bears hug 

 people to death they are there, thrilled by the pros- 

 pect of what they are about to witness with but a very 

 vague idea of what it will be. A dear old lady from the 

 quiet eddies of some sheltered spot has been brought 

 in by the rest of her party to see " goin's on " of which 

 she does not approve because gambling is a well-known 

 sin. She is somewhat reassured by noting a few seats 



191 



