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the  growth  of  American  wealth,  nearly  all
these  securities  are  now  held  by  the  Americans
themselves,  so  that  Wall  Street  is  now  the
chief  market,  and  the  influences  affecting  Wall
Street  will  control  the  prices  of  American
Railway  Securities.
Bearing  these  factors  in  mind,  the  above
rule  embraces  all  the  knowledge  which  is
requisite  to  enable  anyone  to  invest  safely
and  profitably  in  stocks  and  shares,  and  if  it  is
closely  observed,  in  scarcely  any  event  can
capital  be  exposed  to  danger.
But  the  investor  must  clearly  understand
that  the  observance  of  any  part  of  the  rule  will
avail  him  nothing  if  he  is  unwise  enough  to
disregard  the  remaining  portion.  The  efficacy
of  the  rule  lies  in  the  mutual  support  which
its  component  parts  lend  to  each  other,  and,
finally,  it  is  their  combined  sustaining  power
which  preserves  the  equilibrium  of  capital.
In  the  early  part  of  this  chapter  we  gave
an  illustration  of  the  result  produced  from  an
investment  in  three  British  Trustee  stocks,
viz.  ;  Birmingham  Corporation  Stock,  London
and  North  Western  Railway  Company  Debenture, ­
  and  Southern  Mahratta  Railway  Company
Guaranteed  Stock.  We  there  saw  depicted  a
loss  of  rather  more  than  20  per  cent,  on  the
original  cost  within  a  few  years  from  the  time