the investigator considerably, for he says: "We find, after the greatest increase in the purchasing power of the dollar that this country has ever experienced or is ever likely to experience, that his [the imaginary investor's] holdings in 1885 have a market value of $10,936, an actual increase, where, if no other factor than the appreciating dollar were in force, a drastic decrease was to have been expected." Whether a drastic decrease in prices of industrial shares was to be expected would depend, however, rather on the view that one takes of the probability that the fall in the rate of interest which almost always accompanies a fall in commodity prices would tend to maintain the prices of shares by making money plentiful and cheap. It or some other influence certainly did so in this case, in spite of a considerable decline in the earning power of the ten selected investments. Just as in England in the spell of low prices and cheap money which culminated in 1896-97, when 23 per cent. Consols rose to 114, those which were thought to be the soundest Home Railway ordinary stocks rose to a level at which they only returned about 3 per cent. to the buyer.
With regard to the income received under this test, Mr. Smith seems to depart for a moment from the serene impartiality with which
