To do this there was one thing besides the manufacturing of the
chips--stocks--that was absolutely necessary--a gambling-hell, the working
of whose machinery would place a selling value upon such chips; a hell
where, after selling the chips, they could be won back. I saw that if
these tricksters were to be routed and their 'System' was to be destroyed,
it must be through the machinery of this Stock Exchange. I studied the
machinery, and presently I marvelled that men could for so long have been
asses.
"From the very nature of stock-gambling it is necessary, absolutely
necessary, that it be conducted under certain rules, unchangeable,
unbreakable rules, to attempt to change or break which would destroy
stock-gambling. The foundation rule, the rule absolutely necessary for the
existence of stock-gambling is: Any member of the Stock Exchange can buy,
or sell, between the opening and the closing of the Exchange as many
shares of stock as he cares to. With this rule in force his buying and
selling cannot be restricted to the amount he can take and pay for, or
deliver and receive pay for, because there is not money enough in the
world to pay for what under this same rule can be bought and sold in a
single session.
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