THE CREDULOUS YANKEE.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXX, Issue 8437, 8 May 1907, Page 3

THE CREDULOUS YANKEE.

HOW THE AMERICAN PUBLIC IS SWINDLED. Once upon a time a man advertised that he would sell steel engravings of General George Washington, ' "reproduced from Government plates," at the very remarkable price of fivepence, and, in a spirit of gracious condescension, signified a willingness to accept postage stamps in payment. Those who availed themselves of this latter convenience experienced the pleasing sensation of having one of the five penny stamps which they forwarded him returned by the next mail. Clever? Decidedly; and the swindler reaped a fortune out of his shrewdness. One of the most amazing examples of imposture was that of Dowie, the self-styled "Elijah," whose death occurred a few weeks ago at Zion City, Illinois, U.S.A. The Yankee, despite all his vaunted shrewdness, has been the prey of more cunning rogues than the citizen of any other land on the face of the world, says a New York paper. The post regulations of America exercise a very sleepy guardianship over the honesty of the mails. They are rules largely made up of exceptions. The ; American Government has presumably placed a formidable weapon in the hands of the Postmaster-General, • but close listening to the reports from his seemingly powerful blunderbuss will disclose the fact that it is very much a dummy weapon, and that its charges are largely powder, which may produce a temporary fright,^but . seldom in injury targets at which their offence is directed. In view of the fact that Congress is at the present moment actively engaged in a revision of the laws governing the post, to the end that a recodification will probably supplant the existing statutes with really effective and substantial regulations, a brief recount of some of the most flagrant frauds which have been possible under the former > status of affairs may be interesting. MAIL ORDERS. The mail order business, owing to the thousands of villages and hamlets very much sequestrated from the larger centres, has developed into one of the wonderful institutions! of America. Stoves and • waggons, ploughs and sewing machines, as 1 well as cravats and braces and blouses and stockings, are advertised for sale direct from the maker to the user. ' As a natural sequence to th? growth of this business, cheap publications, issued Weekly and monthly, were before long flooding the country. These periodicals were sold at a very nominal sum, and were edited for farmers and villagers, so as to secure a clientele of readers which would be most valuable to advertisers desiring to sell goods where ( they would not be faced with the i competition of establishments offering similar wares on the ground-. , In the beginning, the advertisement which they carried were legiti- ' mate, but the sharper, ever alert to j find a new avenue of activity, soon < became aware of this splendid channel for pursuing his shady calling, and perceiving the advantage of making propositions which called for advance payment upon wares which would be examined after they were owned, the brotherhood of the shady before long infested the mails with their mirages and lures. A FALSTAFF ARMY. Disbarred physicians and physicians who had never known the fostering care of an alma mater; healers of every school; promoters of mines out of which no gold was to be taken, but only poured in; vendors of stock, in companies which proposed to accomplish everything, from air lines to the moon down to railroads which would never know a mile of track; as well as a ho3t of petty swindlers and marauders—all came circling to the feast like carrion attracted - from every quarter of the heavens by the sight of a first brother swooping down upon a. newly-found quarry.

It would be useless to attempt to detail the story of' the mining swindles that have besmirched the none too fair name of American promotion. At the present moment the American- newspapers are packed Sith pages announcing potential El orados. The recent discoveries of gold in the deserts of Arizona and in Nevada have resulted in a swarm of mining companies, all of which purport to possess the most valuable claims in history.

f And not one of these minir/g companies out of a hundred can prove that its claims are even being worked; can furnish evidence that ore is being taken from the earth or carried to the smelters. It is incomprehensible that the American people, so boastful of their commonaense, assurance, and caution, should pour into the tills of these financial Jack Shepherds and Dick Turpins a , stream of treasured savings that is rolling into the millions of pounds. The present status of affairs is only comparable to the oil craze that illuminated the North American continent with its seductive ( glare some half-dozen years ago. RIVER OF PETROLEUM. The town of Beaumont, in Texas, was founu »:) be built over a subterranea., ■uver of petroleum. A few really genuine wells were sunk. The news was spread. Within .a month every available acre of land Within a hundred miles of this township Was in the hands of promoters. Enough gushers" were advertised to.supply illuminating fuel for the whole world in all the ages to come; Then for a while Mexican and South American plantations were the , fashion. The Isthmus of Tehuantepec, in the southern part of Mexico, was exploited as the most wonderful „ rubber district in the world. Statis- * tics setting forth the number of trees that could be planted within an acre, the length of time it took for a tree to bear rubber, the profit that was sure to be realised from 1 every rubber-tree, occupied page after nage in the press. For a year the stream of gold flowed rubberwards. The seamstresses and the clerks, the farmers and the merchants saw before Jthem visions of fortunes which would expand with the same capacity as the product in j which they were interested. Enough land was disposed of to form a dozen Isthmuses of Tehuante-

pec. One New York newspaper actually produced evidence to show that one of the largest companies had sold plantations which, according to surveys, had to be located under 14ft !of water—a quarter of a mile from solid ground!