Philip Hone (1780-1851) was a New York businessman, Whig leader, member of social and literary societies, and Mayor of the City between 1820 and 1824. After he finished his term of office he kept a diary for the remainder of his life which is an invaluable record of social and political developments in the city in the period leading up to the Civil War.
Wall Street, 1835
October 14. The gambling in stocks in Wall Street has arrived at such a pitch, and the sudden reverses of fortune are so frequent, that it is a matter of everyday intelligence that some unlucky rascal has lost other people’s money to a large amount, and run away, or been caught and consigned to the hands of justice. It is one taken from the mass; there is some swearing among the losers, some regret on the part of the immediate friends of the defaulter, but the chasm on the face of society which his detection and removal occasions is filled up in a day or two. They go to work again to cheat each other, and the catastrophe of Monday is forgotten by Saturday night.
It is every bit as true today as it was back then + a reminder of the constancy of human behavior in the face of temptation.
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