THE OTHER SIDE OF THE PICTURE.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 3327, 30 November 1883, Page 2

THE OTHER SIDE OF THE PICTURE.

Among the witnesses before the Committee of the United States Senate was Jay Gould, the millionaire, who was asked to give an account of his life. He did so in a succinct and graphic manner ; and the story of bis rise from a poor and humble position, has been quoted in nearly every English and American newspaper of any standing. According to Mr Gould’s own story, his has been the model career for the citizens of the Republic. He has risen from the work of a bare-footed cowherd, by bis industry, frugality, and “ enterprise,” to a point where the accumulation of wealth is of no personal interest to him, and where he can devote himself generously to the building up of the country by means of brilliant railway combinations. There are some people, however, who are not inclined to give the great financier the praise his story demands. One of them is the “ Argus ” correspondent. “Mr Gould,” he says, “is only 47 years of age, and he controls 10,000 miles of railway, and some 100,000 miles of telegraph lines. This is a long way from the time which he described when, penniless and without food, he knelt in the woods and prayed fervently for rescue from his misery. I do not believe Mr Gould prays much these days, at least not in private. I think it would require the presence of his fellow-men to enable him to go through oven the form of presenting himself at the throne of grace, for if there ever was an unscrupulous and heartless scoundrel, he is the man. He did not tell the Committee, and the Committee consider, ately refrained from asking him, the history of his Erie transactions, though when the judges he had bribed were driven from the bench, and the real owners got possession of the road, he purchased immunity from prosecution as a thief and a swindler, by surrendering a large sum, some 10,000,000d015. of his booty. Nor did he tell his share in the ‘ Black Friday ’ business, when, by locking up gold and by enormous purchases, which he afterwards repudiated, he drove the value of the Government notes down below 40 per cent, and ruined scores of men, not only in Wall street but throughout the country. Nor did he describe the long and shameful war wbioh he waged against the English bondholders of Erie in the New York Legislature, in the course of which he was responsible for the most wholesale corruption. Nor did he make any allusion to the asasult upon one of the ablest newspaper writers of New York —the Hon. Dorman B. Eaton—now Chairman of the Civil Service Commission, because of articles written by him against the notorious frauds in the Erie road. And as Mr Gould controls the telegraph facilities of nearly all the newspapers in the United States, it is not singular that his omissions have not generally been remarked by the Press. Mr Gould’s steam yacht, the Atalanta, is completed, but he has not yet started on that tour about the world which ho said last summer he meant to meant to take. He probably lied about his intentions as he does about other things, when be can see his interest in doing so. Instead of sailing around the world, he has been engaged during the last four months in a turn of the market, from which he probably made several millions, and surely made a largo sum. lie sold his own stocks ‘ short ’ to very large amounts, until they fell from five to fifteen per cent, and then * wont long’ on them until they have about regained their former level, and in the process, ruined two of the large firm of brokers through whom ho had been used to act. The only man with whom he is reputed to keep uniform good faith, is one who was his principal agent in the gold speculation of ‘ Black Friday,’ and who in the course of that wild game, performed acts, it is believed, which would, if established in Court, send both him and Gould to the penitentiary, and the common knowledge of this little transaction forms a bond of close union between the two worthies.’*