Finance.

The announcement last week, that the Midvale Steel & Ordnance Co. was to absorb the important Cambria Steel Co., attracted attention for several reasons. Midvale is a holding company, organized last October, at the height of the speculation in the "war munitions shares." Wall Street's impression at that time was, that the new concern, was designed to absorb under one control the larger munitions-making corporations, and to sell to the outside public the capital stock issued in getting that control. With such an imputed purpose, it could not fail to be a reminder of the huge mergers of the steel and other enterprises, at the height of the great industrial speculation which began in 1899 and culminated in 1902.