As the Wall Street boy advances in proficiency he is put upon the purchase and sale books. Then he takes charge of the comparison tickets, and then of the stock ledgers. Then he becomes a bookkeeper or cashier, and if he shows himself valuable enough he receives a junior partnership, and later on rises to a higher one.
It is proper to say, however, that only a small proportion of the boys who begin life in Wall Street work their way upward to positions of consequence. Fully fifty per cent. of them go wrong, or, at all events, leave the Street, and are not heard of afterward. Not less than half of the others remain in subordinate places. Either they lack the intelligence, energy, and fidelity necessary to secure advancement, or they have vicious tendencies which lead them into trouble.
There is a class of speculating establishments in the neighborhood of Wall Street which are known among the brokers as "bucket-shops," where any one can go and risk one dollar, or as much more as he likes in speculation in stocks. Suppose he has but one dollar; he places it upon a certain stock, and watches the indicator till it goes up or down. If it rises a point, he makes a dollar, but if it goes down he loses, and the dollar he risked is wiped out.
Men with very limited capital are the chief patrons of these bucket-shops, but a good many of the boys slip around to them, and risk anywhere from one dollar to five dollars in speculation. Sooner or later they come to grief. A knowledge of their conduct reaches the ears of their employers, they lose their situations, and have great difficulty in getting others.
Boys are taken into brokerage offices only upon good recommendations, and it is almost invariably required that a boy shall live with his parents and not by himself. Employers well know that a boy not living at home is far more likely to fall into evil ways than one who has a home and is under the eyes of father and mother.
In addition to their regular wages the boys in Wall Street offices receive presents in money at Christmas-time, the amount depending partly upon the good conduct of the boy himself, and partly on the condition of business in the year just closing. If times have been hard, speculation light, and incomes small, the broker's gratuities to his employees are much smaller than if the reverse is the case. In the one instance, he feels poor and forced to economize; in the other, he feels prosperous and is liberal.