AGRICULTURAL CREDIT.—DAVIDSON. 463 
wild west. The banks are ready for any kind of business that 
is profitable, and does not depart radically from their methods of 
doing business. Agriculture requires a kind of eredit they have 
not been in the habit of giving. The farmer asks credit for too 
long a period, and above all, for an uncertain and indefinite 
period, if it is to be of the fullest advantage to him. Moreover, 
the banker knows little of the individual farmer, and has but 
very limited opportunities for watching the business proceedings 
of a farmer who borrows; and the ordinary process of everyday 
business does not bring the farmer debtor under the banker's 
observation as it does the merchant or manufacturer who bor- 
rows. When the farmer is ready to market his crop, the bank is 
more ready to do business, although the business is usually done 
by middlemen ; but as a producer, as a farmer pure and simple, 
he has not, and in the nature of things cannot expect to have, 
the same credit facilities as the merchant. What may be the 
case when the government does fully what in Australasia and to 
a much less extent in Canada, governments are beginning to do, 
viz., to guarantee a market for the farmer’s produce, and even to 
advance the price, or part of the price, is another question. In 
such cases the banks ought to be willing to treat the farmer on 
the most favourable terms; bnt in such a case the farmer is 
likely, having cash in hand, to be comparatively independent of 
bank advances. But till that time the farmer has not much to 
look for from the banks. It is true, as the Hon. Mr. Blake has 
asserted (Hansard, 1890, p. 4295) that, 
“The moment a farmer can show that he can give the same 
prospect of a return, with the same advantage, with the same 
security that other competitors for the stock of available money 
can give, he will get all the money he wants; and to the extent 
he cannot show that he will never get it.” 
But it must be remembered that the difficulty lies in the 
nature of the business, not in the honesty of the borrower. The 
problem of agricultural credit is not the problem how to supply 
money at low rates of interest to those who do not deserve to 
get it and do not know how to use it. That is likely to remain 
