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Poverty Bay Standard, Volume I, Issue 217, 23 August 1884, Page 2

For a number of years a large body of confiding small capitalists have been investing their earnings in a speculation which up to the present has proved a fraud, and which there is every reason to believe will continue to do so. We refer to the South Pacific Petroleum Company, the head quarters of which are in Sydney. At the present time there are upwards of 25,000 forfeited shares advertised for sale, the owners of which seem inclined to cry “peccavi!” These innocents abroad are only just beginning to realise the fact that they have been all this time the sport of a clique of foreign capitalists, whose sole object has been to devise means to prevent oil being struck. The idea has at last dawned upon them that they have sufficiently long played the of milch cows, in fact, of a complete butter and cheese factory, for a few wily speculators whose motto is “ how not to do it.” It would never do to strike oil while gulls can be found to invest in shares at double their market value, and then have to relinquish them and allow capitalists to get them back for a song, only to retain them until the innocents were found in sufficient numbers to again take possession of a large number of the shares, pay up calls enough to save the wily ones any expense, and then forfeit the shares in disgust. Not only have a few “ oily ” ones been making large profits by handing over the shares to small capitalists, and then waiting their opportunity to get them back again, but they have been doing their best not to discover the much desired supply of petroleum. But the game seems to be nearly up. Every announcement of forfeited shares for sale is longer than its predecessors, and now the number exceeds 25,000, out of a total 45,000. In addition to this it is rumored that another call will be made within a day or two after the forfeited shares and put up to auction. Our only wonder is that the public have allowed themselves to be worked upon so long. As the copy-books of our youth used to say, “ experience teaches many useful lessons,” and no doubt the experience bought by innocent ininvestors in oil shares will stand them in good stead.