MELBOURNE STOCK EXCHANGE.

Waikato Times, Volume XXXIX, Issue 3159, 22 September 1892, Page 3

MELBOURNE STOCK EXCHANGE.

The country visitors to the Stock Fxchange on any ordinary day in the week would bo likely to conclude that Melbourne was still booming. The great hall of the Exchange is usually "a busy scene of crowded life, - ' where you listen in vain unless you have the poetic imagination, for that " sid still music of humanity " which is an underlying current even in tho babel tones of busy brokers. The cathedral-like columns and mosaic*, the niched roof and gothic windows, you Hs-siHiiite with the temple, but there is little- el-r, not even the " dim religious light " to instil a profound respect for tho ministering spirits arouud you, who so'ir above you only in their scrip in scriptural quotations. High priests no doubt these brokers are, and through devious paths they lead the people, but ilu-ir wisdom is of the world, and their slirino tho golden calf, before which they bow the knee reverently or irreverently, ncconiinir to their bnm*nr, for though very cold and calculating enough on nodsinn, they are frequently it happy-go-lucky lot. They go throuirli the world smiling, and if you are nit careful, they will jro through yon and leave you sighing, and forever after you will persist that the broker is a broken reed. Certainly it is not wise to expect solid support from the gentleman who has himself to look after. With only number one to keep straight, oftimes he suddenly snaps asunder, and becomes " a hi oker" iu the wide signi firint senso of the word which applies to mo>t of us now-a-dnys. Once he is properly " broke," it is nsually a case •with him, and subsequent proceedings in the s<hare market interest our priest no more. Gold, silver, tin, breweries, trams and gas, their rise and fall are all one to him in his decline, for without " the rhino '' to work on, the gates of paradise are closed to him. If we must be worshippers at the same sbrine, we must be rery in our attendance at the Temple, and study the daily texts as they appear om the blackboard there not forgetting to commit them to memory, or pine it is likely to come home to us that it is better to be cold than lukewarm, or in Yankee phraseology that we should either leavo share gambling alone altogether, or go " the whole hog." All or nothing must be thu speculator's motto, and he will be a bully boy if he survive the hurly burly.—(Exchange).