ndon as a financial rival. All Englishmen will hope that the day
when she will be in a position to challenge us again will come
quickly.

As to Berlin, the only other possible rival to London in Europe, very
little need be said. The German authority quoted above has already
shown some of the difficulties with which Berlin has to struggle.
He spoke of the narrow-mindedness of German finance, of the "petty
quibbling" which often disturbs the relations between buyer and
seller, of the "dubious practices of many kinds, infringements of
payment stipulations, unjustifiable deductions," etc., and the
"ruthless" action of the cartels. He acknowledges that though Germany
had a gold standard "too much anxiety used to be shown when the gold
export point was reached," and that "it was also feared that to export
gold would incur the wrath of the Reichsbank."

With these disadvantages to struggle against, quoted from the mouth of
a German observer, Germany has also succeeded by her ruthless policy
during the war in earning the deep hostility of the greater part of
mankind. Sentiment probably enters into business relations a good deal
more than most business men admit, and for any country to set out to
gain the leadership in trade and finance by outraging the feelings of
most of its possible customers is an extraordinary piece of stupidity.

It seems, then, that apart from the relative weakening of London as
compared with New York, there is very little need for us to fear any
serious change in England's financial position after the war as long
as the Government's faulty finance is not allowed too seriously to
endanger the position of our gold standard. It is true that we shall
not benefit, as much as we undoubtedly have in the past, from the
"help of Germans" in developing our finance. But indirectly the
Germans will still be helping us by the great stimulus that the war
will have given us towards efficiency and hard work.

What we have to do in order to secure London's position after the war
is to restore as soon as we can the system that had established it in
the century before the war. We have to show the world that, far from
any intention to abandon Free Trade, we mean to take a long step
forward along the line of international activity which has been the
source of our greatness in the past. We want, as soon as possible, to
get back that freedom from Government control which has given us such
elasticity and adaptability to our