Page:The Wizard of Wall Street and his Wealth.djvu/97

 counsel, in one room and the newly chosen directors in another, the doors of both rooms barred, opening to no one but an avowed friend, each fearful of orders of arrests being served on them, every spare room in the offices filled with blue-coated officers of the peace, sitting in all the chairs and on all the tables and lying on the floors, and an intense sense of subdued excitement pervading the heavy air of the place.

The only communication between the two hostile parties was by means of Peter B. Sweeney, who acted as go-between.

Finding that he was defeated, Gould then resorted to one of those acts of audacity with which at different periods in his career he has surprised the public. In a public letter he offered to leave all the questions in dispute to arbitration by Horace Greeley. Thus he attempted to place himself in favorable light before the public. But it should not be supposed that Greeley was in any sense a friend of Gould. On the contrary, the Tribune of that day show's how severely he criticised Gould.

The battle lasted one night and then Gould surrendered. He remained as a director for a time, but his power was gone and Erie passed out of his hands forever. The property has never fully recovered from the condition into which it was thrown by the Drew-Gould regime. Though one of the most important systems in the country and enjoying an immense business, it is crippled with its enormous stock and bond liabilities, and not until 1891 did it