A SOUTH AMERICAN BOOM.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XV, Issue 4335, 3 February 1893, Page 2

A SOUTH AMERICAN BOOM.

Rmakable Swindle,

In these days of booms one is ' hardly surprised at anything, but ' nevertheless the following from the ' Buenos Ayres Standard's Paniquay correspondent is almost beyond belief. ' He says:—lf anything can be related < in the way of news from Paraguay it '. is the extraordinary speculation in I 12th October postage stamps and e.v velopes, out of which soma have made < a good deal of money, and the public ! generally lost. The issue made on that day, and for use on that day only, was about 60,000 stamps of 10 cents each and 10,000 envelopes oi 20 cents each. One or two clever people conceived the idea that there was money to be made in Ihe business and bought up all they could ou the day of issue at the face value and then sent out buyers to take up tho rest at a premium. The report was eagerly taken up that there are 50,000 stamp collectors in Europe to be supplied out of the small issue of the 12lh, and that the competition which the limited supply must give rise to is bound to give the article an unprecedented value. Telegrams were also stated to havo been received, giving the prices obtainable at Buenos Ayres, always favourble, of course, always on the rise. The consequence was that, with few exceptions, everybody was sucked into the pool, and, like a snowball rolling down hill, increasing more its bulk at each succeeding turn, eaofi succeeding day made more victims than the previous one. There is no Bolsa in Asuncion, but one was soon improvised in the Cafe Polo Norte, where, inside and outside, from early morn till the early hours of the following day, raged, I believe, as mad as speculation as ever took place. Asuncion : is not a big place, not too big for everyone to know everyone else by sight; that is we thought so, mistakenly, for a noticeable fact in connection with the mania was the Btrange faces, In fact everybody turned out and of course had a stake in tho game. The fury of the speoula* 1 tion was of course at its greatest just | before the collapse. Indeed, ooinpara- | tively little notice was taken of it by i the publio generally until within three , or four days of the end. There can be no doubt about it, many were standing to \un large sums of money —oil' l bouse is stated to have oleared t 450,000 dollars. When tho bubble hurst some were caught holding as \ many as 2000 stamps, which' they . might havo sold on the previous day at 80 dollars a piece. These were at i ono time as high as 35 dollars each, i Envelopes reached 95 dollars. On the night of Friday last. 4th iust., it was 1 evident that there were rocks ahead, ' although it was not until the s.s, Sat- ' urno arrivedon the following afternoon •■ that the cr>ish came, and that people i who thought until then that their pile i was made had tho sweet morsel oi long ■ oherißhed and now at last satisfied [ hope turn to ashes in the mouth, To form an idea of this mania you must know that people pledged houses and lands for stamps. Bpleudid geld ' watches changed hands for four or I five stamps; diamond pins and brooches for two or threo Htamped , onvelopEß; tailors and bootmakers i contracted their respective wares for 1 stamps. Nay more, Indies, I grieve to | say, were led to sell their trinkets and i their relics for this new idol of the , hour, Tho long faces of holders of | stamps and envelopes just before and i aftor tho smash camo have given : origin to a fresh expression—when a 1 man looks down in the mouth you 1 say he has a '.< cara do catampilla," ' What a lot of fools you say there must be in Paraguay, Yes, but aren't , " the one or two clever people" i about aa clover as they make 'em ?