There the streets and houses, the theatres, clubhouses, magnificent mansions, huge hotels, languished, half-finished, some a story, some two stories high, exposed to wind and weather. In the midst of a great city there was all this desolation, as if an enemy had wreaked his vengeance on this quarter only.
Large as were the sums derived from his other properties—houses and shops and land, which were occupied—it was all eaten up in the attempt to finish this marble Rome in the middle of a brick Babylon. Heavy amounts too had to be disbursed to keep the railway going, for it did not pay a fraction of dividend yet. Men of business pressed on Sternhold. “Let us complete the place,” they said. “Sell it to us on building leases; no one man can do the whole. Then we will form three or four companies or syndicates, lease it of you, complete the buildings, and after seventy years the whole will revert to you or your heirs.”
Still Sternhold hesitated. At last he did lease a street or two in this way to a company, who went to work like mad, paid the masons and bricklayers double wages, kept them at it day and night, and speedily were paying twenty percent, dividends on their shares out of the rents of the completed buildings. This caused a rush. Company after company was formed. They gave Sternhold heavy premiums for the privilege to buy of him; even then it was difficult to get him to grant the leases. When he did accept the terms and the ready cash, every halfpenny of it went to complete streets on his own account; and so he lived, as it were, from hand to mouth.
After all this excitement and rush, after some thousands of workmen were put at it, they did not seem to make much impression upon the huge desolation of brick and mortar. Streets and squares rose up, and still there were acres upon acres of wilderness, foundations half-dug out and full of dirty water, walls three feet high, cellars extending heaven only knew where.
People came for miles to see it, and called it “Baskette’s Folly.” After a while, however, they carefully avoided it, and called it something worse—i.e. “The Rookery;” for all the scum and ruffianism of an exceptionally scummy and ruffianly residuum chose it as their stronghold. Thieves and worse—ill-conditioned women—crowds of lads, gypsies, pedlars—the catalogue would be as long as Homer’s—took up their residence in these foundations and cellars. They seized on the planks which were lying about in enormous piles, and roofed over the low walls; and where planks would not do they got canvas.
Now, it is well-known that this class of people do not do much harm when they are scattered about and separated here, there, and everywhere over a city; but as soon as they are concentrated in one spot, then it becomes serious. Gangs are formed, they increase in boldness; the police are defied, and not a house is safe.
This place became a crying evil. The papers raved about it, the police (there were police now) complained and reported it to headquarters. There was a universal clamour. By this time Stirmingham had got a corporation, aldermen, and mayor, who met in a gorgeous Guildhall, and were all sharp men of business. Now the corporation began to move in this matter of “Baskette’s Folly.” Outside people gave them the credit of being good citizens, animated by patriotic motives, anxious for the honour of their town, and desirous of repressing crime. Keen thinkers knew better—the Corporation was not above a good stroke of business. However, what they did was this: After a great deal of talk and palaver, and passing resolutions, and consulting attorneys, and goodness knows what, one morning a deputation waited upon Sternhold Baskette, Esq., at his hotel (he always lived at an hotel), and laid before him a handsome proposition. It was to the effect that he should lease them the said “Folly,” or incomplete embryo city, for a term of years, in consideration whereof they would pay down a certain sum, and contract to erect buildings according to plans and specifications agreed upon, the whole to revert in seventy years to Sternhold or his heirs.
Sternhold fought hard—he asked for extravagant terms, and had to be brought to reason by a threat of an appeal by the Corporation to Parliament for a private Act.
This sobered him, for he was never quite happy in his secret mind about his title. Terms were agreed upon, the earnest money paid, and the masons began to work. Then suddenly there was an uproar. The companies or syndicates who had leased portions of the estate grew alarmed lest this enormous undertaking should, when finished, depreciate their property. They cast about for means of opposing it. It is said—but I cannot believe it—that they gave secret pay to the thieves and ruffians in the cellars to fight the masons and bricklayers, and drive them off.
At all events serious collisions occurred. But the Corporation was too strong. They telegraphed to London and got reinforcements, and carried the entrenchments by storm.
Then, so goes the discreditable rumour, the companies bribed the masons and bricklayers, who built so badly that every now and then houses fell in, and there was a fine loss! Finally they got up an agitation, cried down the Corporation for wasting public funds, and, what was far more serious, brought high legal authority to prove that as a Corporation they had no power to pledge themselves to such terms as they had, or indeed to enter into such a contract without polling the whole city.
This alarmed the Corporation. There were secret meetings and long faces. But if one lawyer discovers a difficulty, another can always suggest a way round the corner. The Corporation went to Parliament, and got a private Act; but they did not go as a body. They went through Sternhold, who was persuaded;
