FURTHER FRAUDS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18357, 24 March 1923, Page 1 (Supplement)

FURTHER FRAUDS.

BUSINESS EXPERIENCES.

BY B. EAKLE VAH.E. ; i i |

At the request of a number of friends I venture to write particulars of other swindles that have passed under my notice.. The tricks and twists of the perverted ability which seeks to get rich quickly by ways that are dark often have their humorous side. My former article was confined to land swindles- In this 1 will venture outside that sphere to other frauds. The house of Vaile has always been afflicted with the inventive faculty. New inventions may be good but patents are always bad, and are only a means of quickly dissipating money slowly made by honest toil. Personally, I have rigorously restricted this fatal propensity to such small private matters as the quick and easy putting on of & stiff collarthat was, of course, in the days before I became a farmer. But a cheery relative, an incurable optimist and an excellent colonist whose only assets were two dozen children (he had two wivesnot at the same time but one after the other, you know) had a brain wave as to a lightning method of affixing one's boots to his person, in a moment of 'time—in the daily rush from breakfast to bus. However, he had not the wherewithall to patent the idea and went to a business man who agreed to pay the necessary £2 in consideration of a half interest in the invention. It was a really good "notion," as the Yankees say, and before long our business friend had sold to a lawyer (sweet simple soul) an eighth share for £400 and further allowed himself to be persuaded to part with sundry other shares for £50 each. Now, my relative came to me saying, "So this £2 rascal is making hundreds out of my brains whereas I can't get a cent., indeed not a smell, and am perishing for food. Will yon take an interest and form a company to work the patent." The end of it was that I gave him a sum equal to £1 per head of his family and then got our business friend and his sub-purchasers to agree to a company, had "memorandum" and "articles of association" and all completed and signed and my unworthy self appointed secretary. Then it was that I asked the business man to hand over the papers when it turned out that he had not even paid the £2 and there was no patent! I could not prosecute and his victims would not. The £400 lawyer and the others were too heartily ashamed of their simplicity to expose their folly to the public ridicule and so the rogue escaped. The immoral of all this is: if a thing is worth doing at all it is worth doing well— your goose so thoroughly that he won't dare to squeal and draw attention to his nakedness and absurdity. Landlord and Tenant. The poor down-trodden tenant has the sympathy of most generous-hearted folk, but here is a case where the tables were turned on the hated oppressor with a vengeance. Came to me one day a fairly well-known business man—let us call him Endersen—remarking he thought wo were agents for Mr. Dingdong : he much liked Mr. house at Epson? and was, ready to take a iease of it. I replied that Mr. Dingdong occupied the place himself, and was most unlikely to go out. However, to my surprise, when I put the matter before him, Mr.' Dingdong remarked that he had lived in that locality long enough. He had acquired a choice site at Devonport and would build on it. I then arranged a lease of the Epsom house for five years, and a half-year's rent was paid down "to bind the bargain." The new house was built and possession given to Mr. Endersen of the old one. About two months later Mr. E. came into my office, and, putting a key on the table, obnerved that business called him across the seas; he had therefore left the house and here was the key. I replied "That's pretty tropic: you've got a lease for five years," to which he made answer and said "Please yourself. I'll take the key with me if you like." "Wait on," said I, and proceeded to consult our client Dingdong. When that worthy gentleman grasped the position he turned livid and though a most pious pillar of the Church he altered the Benediction so far as to exclaim "May the curse of God rest upon him!" "Good enough for him," said I "but what about that house! It seems to me that the position is thai the rent is paid 4 monthß in advance : another month must elapse before default is made and it will be at least another month before you can get an order for possession. If you don't take the key you will have to stand helplessly by looking at an empty house for six months; and during that time you may bet that the young workers of the district will put in a lot of overtime fixing the house and grounds to their fanoy." Poor Mr. Dingdong consulted his solicitors who counselled him to accept my advice, and the key, and his loss. Timber Working. In the old days when we were so lost to all sense of the rights of the few thousands already in the Colony as to welcome further settlers of our own race to help in the work of making this wilderness fit for human habitationin these days of darkest ignorance I say we lurea immigrants to this portion of God's Own Country by the free grant of 40 acres of virgin land. Among other tracts the parish of Pupuke.was cut up for this purpose. When the newcomers went to take possession they found an apparently illimitable and very dense kauri forest. Having unanimously resolved that the mere cutting of tracks to the sections would cost a great deal more than the land was worth, the selectors retired and most of them were so disgusted that they did not even uplift their grants. However, when kauri came to be valuable, contractors and millers eagerly sought out the owners of these forty acre sections. Having secured a section they got promptly to work "to cut out the timber ; and, notwithstanding the keenness of their search for the boundary pegs many of these buyers discovered to their dismay that they had cleared about 500 acres before they found that they were over the edge! A particularly valuable block of 200 acres [this selector must have had a family) was registered in the name of one Church. • Lots of earnest timber workers were more keen to go to Church than they had been ever before. Too late, they sought but they could not find. However, one smart lawyer had an inspiration that the true Church was to be found in Melbourne. Thither went he; and, if he didn't find salvation, he quickly found the Church who executed a conveyance to the lawyer's nominee. This bright ornament of the legal profession witnessed the conveyance himself : so there could be no doubt as to its validity ! Returning to Auckland he registered the deed, paid the accumulated grant and safe fees, uplifted the grant and had a title quite perfect for the prompt removal of timber ! The other buyers were badly left and could only sigh "The nearer the Church the farther from grace."