ABSTRACT
The services of the promoter are easier, but also less necessary in relation to those industries, which are in the hands of men accustomed to deal with large capitals, and familiar with the modern methods of production and marketing. And investors are learning as they go: in so far as the hopes held out by the promoter of recent amalgamations are unduly high, and are falsified by experience in coming years, the task of his successors will be more difficult. But in the most notable amalgamations the promoter has occupied himself chiefly with vigorous concerns. But, with a few exceptions, they have avoided extreme speculative courses: and they have not stretched out their hands towards a concentrated direction or control of trade and manufacture; being perhaps to some extent warned off by that spirit of individuality which the people have noted as underlying representative French industries.
