inconvertible in fact because gold could not be exported—could not be allowed to pursue its riotous way unchecked, unless the country was prepared to face the final result in total worthlessness of the currency.
Thus the Treasury Minute and the rise in Bank Rate, which thus made its first appearance as a sort of moral weapon, to be moved up or down for the good of our souls, were a timely reminder of forgotten truths, but their doctrine had little immediate effect. For several more months extravagance, inflation and hysterical business continued, and when the check came at last in the spring of 1920, it was rather because the pace was too hot for the home and foreign consumer, than because the producer and the merchant were frightened by a rise of a couple of points in the price of money.
In fact, as will be shown, the contraction in credit which is supposed to be caused by a higher price of money and to cause a lower price of goods, did not make its appearance until long after the bottom had fallen out of the price of goods, and some time after the price of money had begun to come down again. Up till the end of 1919 prices and money—as far as we can trace the latter's movements—moved together with a harmony most satisfying to a statistical mind and to constructors of charts
