19133 A Banker s Warning 



lending money on the Continent, he said, and had 

 lent very little since 1911. For the peoples of Europe 

 would say: "We know we have had the money and 

 have spent it for war preparation; we know we ought 

 to pay interest on it, and sometime the principal, 

 but we must live, and we cannot live under such a 

 burden." 



A great specter will rise up in the future before the moneyed 

 classes when they are forced to spend their gold for war purposes. 

 The handwriting on the wall will spell REPUDIATION! 



"Why do not the bankers discourage loans for fighting?" 

 I am asked. The English banks now do. The French do not. 

 English banks now touch no international loans. French banks 

 make that their business; they are both bankers and brokers, 

 contracting to sell foreign bonds. Representatives of foreign 

 governments come to Paris with full power, bringing bonds 

 divided into small amounts. French banks act as distributing 

 agents, stipulating that at least half the proceeds shall be spent 

 on armament bought in France. 



Bankers and finance houses have no personal views. Only 

 money talks. Teetotalers lend to brewers, and security of what- 

 ever kind can get money. For the last ten years London has 

 lent nothing to the governments of Germany, France, or Austria. 

 Gold has passed freely from London into Canada but merely 

 dribbled into the Continent. Throughout financial Europe 

 there is a growing coldness toward war loans. War lending is a 

 most dangerous game to play. French financiers lost heavily on 

 account of the second Balkan war. It has become hard to pay 

 debts in France. Gold is scarce and the interest rate rises. 

 French and German banks hate wars, though they are tempted 

 to snatch profits from them; but the risk is great. 



Banks are not really international; they have no concerted 

 methods. For this reason English banks cannot cooperate 

 with those of France. "The man on the street" must be con- 

 verted from the idea of war as a settlement of disputes. He 

 is wiser, keener, more intelligent than the "golf-club man," 

 and if you say something worth while he will listen and under- 

 stand. 



515:1 



