176 HISTORY OF THE GRANGE MOVEMENT; OR, 



grants, which have been wrung from the nation through 

 the connivance of delinquent Congresses. These lands 

 had a certain value, and were so much additional pro- 

 perty to mortgage. They made it all the more unne- 

 cessary for the incorporators to provide money of their 

 own, the new advance constituted a double imposition 

 upon the public, an additional gain to the stockholders. 



The receipts from the sales of bonds and of lands having 

 built the road, and the stock having acquired a definite 

 value, the shareholders began to see that their interest 

 lay in selling it and realizing a profit upon that which 

 cost them nothing. Indeed, the only interest they now 

 have in the stock of their road is to sell it at an advance, 

 and they thus inaugurate a series of speculations which 

 lead to corners, a watering of the stock, and a steady 

 depreciation of the value of the property. Boards of 

 directors in sympathy with such operations are chosen, 

 and the processes of watering and stock gambling are 

 carried on until the mountain of debt is piled so high 

 for the road, not for the stockholders that the corpora- 

 tion is unable to meet the interest on the original mort- 

 gage. 



The condition of affairs is singular. The road is in 

 the hands of the stockholders and their directors, who 

 have paid nothing for it. They have exclusive control 

 of it. They constitute a solid, compact body, with a 

 fixed and definite purpose, and are usually under the 

 leadership of some shrewd and able mind. The real 

 owners of the road, the bondholders, with whose money 

 it was built, constitute a vast multitude of small capi- 

 talists, farmers, men unaccustomed to deal with finan- 

 cial matters, widows, orphans, and others. Sometimes 

 large quantities of the bonds are owned in foreign coun- 



