discuss the conditions of convertibility. I deal only with the primary pre-requisite of effectual foreign payments—a sufficient supply of the local legal tender: with the afterstep—the change of the local legal tender into the universally acceptable commodity—I cannot deal.
What I have to deal with is, for the present, ample enough. The Bank of England must keep a reserve of "legal tender" to be used for foreign payments if itself fit, and to be used in obtaining bullion if itself unfit. And foreign payments are sometimes very large, and often very sudden. The "cotton drain," as it is called—the drain to the East to pay for Indian cotton during the American Civil War—took many millions from this country for a series of years. A bad harvest must take millions in a single year. In order to find such great sums, the Bank of England requires the steady use of an effectual instrument.
That instrument is the elevation of the rate of interest. If the interest of money be raised, it is proved by experience that money does come to Lombard Street, and theory shows that it ought to come. To fully explain the matter I must go deep into the theory of the exchanges, but the general notion is plain enough. Loanable capital, like every other commodity, comes where there is most to be made of it. Continental bankers and others instantly send great sums here, as soon as the rate
