stress of war.

Any real improvement to be achieved in the system by which we have
hitherto supplied other nations with capital will ultimately have to be
brought about by a keener appreciation, both by issuing houses and
investors, of the kind of business that is truly legitimate and
profitable. It does not pay in the long run to supply young communities
with opportunities for outrunning the constable, and it is possible that
when this wholesome platitude is more clearly grasped by the public, no
issuing house will be found to bring out a loan that is not going to be
used for some definite reproductive purpose, or to float a company, even
of the semi-speculative kind, the prospects of which have not been so
well tested that the shareholders are at least bound to have a fair
chance of success. The ideals of the issuing houses have so far advanced
since the days of the Honduras scandal, that in the time of the late war
in the Balkans none could be found to father any financial operation in
London on behalf of any of the warring peoples. It only remains for the
education of the investor to continue the progress that it has lately
made, for the waste of capital by bad investment to be greatly
curtailed. Probably there will always, as long as the present financial
basis of society lasts, be outbursts of speculation in which a greedy
public will rush madly after certain classes of stocks and shares, with
the result that a few cool-headed or lucky gamblers will be able to
live happily ever after as country gentlemen, and transmit comfortable
fortunes to their descendants for all time. This is the debt that
society pays for its occasional lapses in finance, just as its lapses in
matters of taste are paid for by the enriching of those who provide it
with rubbishy stuff to read, or rubbishy shows in picture palaces. The
education of the individual in the matter of spending or investing his
or her money is one of the most pressing needs of the future, and only