132 ESSAYS ON WHEAT 



track buyers, who pay interest for it. When the money 

 is repaid to the banks, the banks use it again elsewhere in 

 other seasonal businesses. 



The financial business of forwarding the grain of west- 

 em Canada to the miller is split into four sections: (1) 

 from the farm to Fort William and Port Arthur, (2) from 

 Fort William and Port Arthur to the seaboard or domes- 

 tic miller, (3) from the seaboard to the foreign grain ex- 

 change, and (4) from the foreign grain exchange to the 

 foreign miller. The banks of Canada, through their west- 

 ern branches, so far as the crop movement is concerned, 

 practically confine themselves to financing the crop from 

 the farm to the head of the lakes. 



When the movement of the grain from the farms has 

 once begun and the use of credit has become extensive, it 

 is very important that the grain should be kept moving 

 to the lake front as fast as possible. The quicker the 

 grain can be moved to the lake front and sold for cash, the 

 shorter is the time during which the money required to 

 move the grain is employed, and the sooner is this money, 

 available for other purposes. It is therof )re to the ad- 

 vantage of every one connected with the grain trade, both 

 grain dealers and transportation companies, to keep the 

 grain moving as fast as possible and thus keep credit turn- 

 ing over. The principle of finance here involved is called 

 velocity of credit.'''^ The faster dollars are turned over, 

 the more work do they perform in a given time and the 

 greater are their earning powers. Instead of attempting 

 to finance the western Canadian crop to the seaboard or to 

 foreign grain exchanges, the Western Canadian bankers 

 keep their dollars busily engaged in providing for the 

 financial requirements of trade and commerce within their 

 own territory. 



71 Vide C. B. Piper, loc. cit., pp. 185-186. 



