THE NEW YORK STOCK EXCHANGE.

BY HUBERT EARL.

A little gathering of men met under a buttonwood-tree in 1792, opposite what is now No. 60 Wall Street, and formed an association for the purpose of exchange and more ready current transaction of business. From this crude organization has grown the present New York Stock Exchange with its immense capital. Installed in a dignified edifice between Broad and New streets, with an entrance on Wall Street, its eleven hundred members transact business daily between 10 a.m. and 3 p.m. No transactions are allowed before or after these hours, a heavy fine being the penalty for each offence, and such contracts not being recognized by the governing committee of the Exchange.

A membership in the Stock Exchange is worth a small fortune, for the seats have sold as high as $32,500, though at present they do not bring over $18,000. The brokers are both rich and poor, but adding the value of the memberships to an estimated average capital of $100,000 for each member, $150,000,000 is a conservative figure of the capital invested.

To the casual visitor who finds himself leaning over the handsome balcony rail looking down upon the immense floor of the Board-Room the howling gesticulating crowd of brokers appears like a mob of lunatics, and the occasional half-clipped calls that rise to his ears justify the comparison. Sign-posts are placed about the floor, bearing the names of the different stocks dealt in, and around these posts the brokers gather to buy and sell. When a particular stock is what is termed active, the brokers dealing in it surge madly around the post assigned to it, and amid deafening yells make their contracts. An ideal broker is one whose face never betrays any emotion, but remains perfectly passive, whether his stock transactions net him an enormous gain or lose him a fortune.

Many brokers act as agents for firms, but most firms have their own representative always on the floor. At times, though, to prevent the discovery of a big deal or an attempt to corner the market in some particular stock, it is necessary to call in the service of more brokers. A percentage is paid for such service, the minimum being $2 for every hundred shares that are valued at $100 each.

The members know each other, and frequently in the crowd a broker will stand with his slips in one hand, his eyes glued upon his memoranda, and with his other hand emphasizing his calls with lunging jerks, as he sends forth such yells as "One hundred at 84." Again and again he repeats his yell, and then changes it to 83¾ for a hundred. "Take 'em," comes the cry, to which he answers, "Sold"; and then jots down the transaction, never once looking to see who the buyer was, but relying upon the voice, which he knows. These transactions are invariably fulfilled to the letter, and there is no record during the existence of the Exchange of such a contract being disacknowledged. If this broker wants the transaction sent to his firm, he jots it down on a slip, and before he can turn around, one of the fifty-odd gray-uniformed messengers on the floor takes it, and runs off to the side of the room to that broker's telephone, and hands the memorandum to the operator, who telephones his firm.

Should a firm want to talk with their representative over the telephone, it is necessary to call him off the floor. As none but members are allowed on the floor, and no voice is strong enough to be heard calling above the fearful screech of bids and offers, a number system was devised for this purpose. Each broker has a number, and a rack on one of the walls has a corresponding number. A call is sent to the boy who works the annunciator to put up, say, 48. He pulls a knob, and instantly that number is exposed on the rack. Every now and then each broker glances at his rack, and when he sees his number he goes out either to the telephone or to the messenger or person who may want to see him. This silent call is discontinued after it has served its purpose.

There are a large number of telephones required, and a number of alleyways are partitioned off at the sides of the floor, in which line after line of telephones are placed, each one with its operator, who never leaves it. Then there is the telegraph service. Every transaction of any importance is sent over the wires. It has hardly taken place before the anxious watcher at some ticker reads its record on the tape, whether it be one hundred yards from the floor of the Exchange or a thousand miles away. If he is holding any particular stock that has advanced, and wishing to take advantage of the fact, he decides to sell, he telegraphs his New York brokers to sell for him. They telephone their representative on the floor of the Exchange, and in a very short time these shares are being offered, and the owner, probably miles away, watching the tape of his ticker, notes with a smile of satisfaction the records unfolding before him: 100 shares at 87-3/8, 300 shares 87¼, 200 shares at 87, and so on. These shares may have been purchased by him around 79 or 80, or possibly much less, and the transaction nets him a neat profit. It is often the reverse, though, and almost fortunes are made and lost daily by such speculations.

The stock-brokers do not like long words, as is evidenced in the terms they have regulated into a dialect of their own. To the uninitiated it is very confusing to hear such remarks as "long of stocks," "holding for a raise," "ballooning a stock," "saddling the market," "gunning a stock," etc., etc. Many of these terms are pithy, and very much to the point.

The stock-broker is generally a generous, genial, happy sort of person, well dressed, and, for a life of mental strain, with a reverse of fortune liable to strike him at any time, he keeps in wonderfully good spirits.

The Exchange is most interesting during a panic, when prices are dropping all around, and when stocks that are as solid as foundation-stones begin to drop below par. It is then that the broker grows frenzied—sometimes with fear, sometimes with rage. Fiercely he elbows, jostles, or fights his way through the mad crowd. Shout after shout ascends to the ceiling as the prices fall, and out on the street the quiet retired business man who has come down to watch his shares, only to see them rapidly falling, bites his finger-nails nervously in the anxious crowd that has gathered, listening to the roar. Messengers dart here and there, and mad haste prevails. Suddenly a silence comes over the Exchange, and the crowd on the floor have packed closely around the chairman's platform. He gravely and sadly announces the failure of some well-known firm. This will probably drag down into the vortex two or three smaller houses; and when the full import is realized by the members a deafening yell is heard, and again they dash into the fray to make, save, or lose a fortune.

Strongly contrasted to this are the jollity and merrymaking on the floor of the Exchange before the holidays. High carnival then reigns supreme, and fun and mirth grow furious. Clothes are torn, hats smashed, all in good humor. Gray-haired brokers waltz with each other, play leap-frog, sing, and carry on as wildly as the younger ones. Sometimes, but not often, the chairman imposes a fine on the members for their fun, but it is cheerfully paid. After such toil day in and day out through the long months a little exuberance of spirit is excusable.