Australian Tales - Setis

“I did put it in my bank yesterday, and they threw it out,” said Mr.
Fluff, with a dreadfully injured look. Then he belched out a volley of
invectives, which would have made the board of directors uneasy, had
they heard him. Fearing that I might be supposed by the passers-by to be
conspiring with Mr. Fluff to cause a run on the said bank, I bade him
good-bye, and pursued my way homeward, reflecting on the vast amount
of misery some men suffer for the sake of keeping up a false appearance.
* * * * *
“There is a great depression visible in the city,” remarked a nervous
neighbour, who soon afterwards overtook me, and who was homeward
bound too.
“There is a good deal of excitement,” I replied, “but there is more
dread than danger. It puts me in mind of the commotion that I once
witnessed on board a ship, at a false alarm of fire. The passengers were
all running about, looking as scared as a lot of sheep with a dog amongst
them; but not one of them coolly investigated the cause of the smoke,
which was merely the cook putting out his galley fire with a bucket of
water; so it was nearly all steam after all.”
“But there is real commercial distress at present, and no doubt about
it,” said my sombre neighbour.
“It would be unreasonable to dispute that, Mr. Croke,” I replied. “In
fact, the colony is suffering from a periodical bill-ious disorder,
accompanied with an extraordinary tightness in the chest. But some of
the causes are palpable enough for any one to see, who wants to see
them. I have long held the opinion that there are far too many persons
engaged in the mere business of exchange, both in town and country;
from merchants down to street hawkers. Sellers multiply much faster
than buyers, and trade is too much divided: an unhealthy competition is
the result, which honest traders heavily feel. I have just now given a little
advice to a pseudo-merchant, which I should like to give to a thousand
others who, like him, are struggling to get a living by buying and selling,
instead of working at their trades. The man I refer to has no capital
beyond some accommodation paper of his friend Bladders, who is in a
similar pecuniary position. His bankers have, I suppose, at last
discovered the doubtful character of Mr. Fluff's paper capital, and have
very properly refused to discount it; so he is, commercially speaking,
‘smashed up,’ and I think he is trying his utmost to raise a panic and
‘smash up’ some of his neighbours, in the hope that his own downfall
may be less noticed in the general wreck. Had not poor Fluff been
tempted by that accomplished old schemer, Bill Bladders, to throw aside
his tools and go into business upon a fictitious capital, he would probably
be now, what he was a few years ago, a contented, industrious mechanic,