Page:The Wizard of Wall Street and his Wealth.djvu/156

 *gan to be a financial success and developed other ways there arose quite a clamor, and it was said to be Jay Gould's road, as though it were a dangerous thing to have one man control a road. I thought that it was better to bow to public opinion, so I took the opportunity when I could to place the stock in the hands of investors. In the course of a very few months, instead of owning control of the road I was entirely out of it, and the stock was 20 per cent. higher than I had sold it for. Instead of being thirty or forty stockholders, there were between six and seven thousand, representing the savings of widows and orphans. There were also a great many lady stockholders. That was about four years ago, after Congress enacted very harsh legislation, after they had broken the bargain they had made to get the road through in its early stages."

"You refer to the Thurman act?" asked the chairman.

"Yes, and that closed my connection with the Union Pacific road."

This is a very beautiful picture and it makes out Mr. Gould to be a most public-spirited and generous man—one ready to sacrifice his own interests in obedience to the demand of public opinion. But, having looked on this picture, look upon that drawn by the Pacific Railroad Commission, appointed by President Cleveland in 1887, and composed of ex-Gov. Pattison, of Pennsylvania; E. Ellery Anderson, of New York, and David Littler, of Illinois. The commission made two reports, agreeing