"My dear Dunshunner," said my friend Robert M'Corkindale as he entered myapartments one fine morning in June last, "do you happen to have seen theshare-list? Things are looking in Liverpool as black as thunder. Thebullion is all going out of the country, and the banks are refusing todiscount."
Bob M'Corkindale might very safely have kept his information to himself. Iwas, to say the truth, most painfully aware of the facts which heunfeelingly obtruded upon my notice. Six weeks before, in the fullconfidence that the panic was subsiding, I had recklessly invested mywhole capital in the shares of a certain railway company, which for thepresent shall be nameless; and each successive circular from my brokerconveyed the doleful intelligence that the stock was going down to Erebus.Under these circumstances I certainly felt very far from beingcomfortable. I could not sell out except at a ruinous loss; and I couldnot well afford to hold on for any length of time, unless there was areasonable prospect of a speedy amendment of the market. Let me confessit—I had of late come out rather too strong. When a man has made moneyeasily, he is somewhat prone to launch into expense, and to presume toolargely upon his credit. I had been idiot enough to make my debut in thesporting world—had started a couple of horses upon the verdant turf ofPaisley—and, as a matter of course, was remorselessly sold by myadvisers. These and some other minor amusements had preyed deleteriouslyupon my purse. In fact, I had not the ready; and as every tradesmanthroughout Glasgow was quaking in his shoes at the panic, andinconveniently eager to realise, I began to feel the rever