THE FARMER'S WAR AGAINST MONOPOLIES. 269 



fuel, and paid to this company a tax amounting to large 

 sums during the year. When we remember this we 

 shall have no difficulty in understanding why the stock 

 of this road is such a favorite in the market. 



But the Philadelphia & Heading Railroad is not the 

 only corporation engaged in the effort to run up the 

 price of coal. It is only the principal sinner. All the 

 corporations engaged in the coal carrying trade and in 

 mining have a common interest, which is to extort from 

 the public the highest price it will pay for coal. Their 

 profits are large, excessively large, and it is believed by 

 the public that in order to conceal them the companies 

 have watered their stock to a very great extent. The 

 exact point to which the watering process has been car- 

 ried no one but those in charge of the affairs of the com- 

 panies can tell, but the popular belief places it at a very 

 high figure. 



" Since 1864 the minimum dividend paid in any year 

 by either the Reading & Delaware, Lackawanna & 

 Western, or Lehigh Valley Railroad companies, or the 

 Delaware & Hudson Canal Company, is ten per cent. 

 The Reading has paid as high as fifteen per cent., and 

 each of the others as high as twenty per cent. It can- 

 not be said that the business has not been profitable to 

 them. Ten per cent, per annum is a good return for a 

 railroad investment, and is certainly far above the ave- 

 rage profits of individuals who have embarked in the 

 business of coal mining. 



" It would be interesting to know how much of the 

 round two hundred million dollars representing the 

 capital and debt of the corporations composing the great 

 coal combination is watered stock. A great deal of it 

 is fictitious capital, in our opinion. It is matter of his- 



