Page:A thousand years hence. Being personal experiences (IA thousandyearshen00gree).djvu/75

 out of breath with the load of cares and profits he had constantly in his head, that it seemed positive cruelty to take up his precious time with your comparatively insignificant matters.

This was not Bulling's only great hit. He had encountered one earlier chance of fortune, during the last great mania for Finance, Discount, Loan and Universal Accommodation Companies. These had become so numerous at last, that a good, suitable, or popularity-catching name became the chief difficulty for the new concerns. As one grand resource in this way of course, every point of the compass had been early seized upon in succession, and a separate company duly floated off upon each. Thus there was the Northern, the Western, the North-western, and so on; but, curiously enough, no mind had been original and comprehensive enough to think of the collective compass itself. A rival promoter called Foddles had indeed bethought himself of the half points; and, when he launched the Nor'-half-west Company, boundless fortune seemed, for a brief instant, at his feet; for he had precautionarily patented the whole fractional succession. But it was only for an instant. The thing in that particular direction had already been run to seed, and so poor Foddles disappeared, overwhelmed in preliminary expenses. The genius of Bullings dawned opportunely at this critical stage. He came down upon the astonished market with the Whole Compass, Finance, Discount, Loan and Universal Accommodation Company, Unlimited, and he floated it successfully with a capital fully proportioned to the expansive dignity of the title.