180 THE NATURAL HISTORY OF MONEY DAVIDSON. 



unless the articles offered in exchange conform to his standard 

 of taste. 



The inconveniences of this primitive state of barter are so 

 evident that no race or tribe which has made the first step away 

 from barbarism, can for long remain without some sort of 

 medium of exchange. There is need of some commodity which 

 will be readily received by every one, although at the moment 

 he may not wish to consume it, in the full assurance that he can 

 easily, in his turn, exchange it for the article he does desire. 

 Such an interposed commodity will greatly facilitate exchanges, 

 and to all intents and purposes may be regarded as money. 

 What this interposed commodity is depends almost entirely on 

 circumstances. At first, almost any commodity which is 

 esteemed by everybody in the community will serve the purpose. 

 There is no more foundation for the idea that there was a 

 sort of social contract regarding some one article to be used as a 

 medium of exchange than there is for the other historical 

 fiction that law and language are due to a primitive contract 

 or convention. No one article has been adopted as if by natural 

 right. The original medium of exchange was simply a market- 

 able article with a recognized value. Metallic money has 

 reached its present supremacy because in the struggle for exist- 

 ence it has demonstrated its superiority. There is no natural 

 desire for the precious metals ; and even for gold there does not 

 seem to be any natural and inherent desire apart from its utility. 

 The sacra fames auri is a fiction of the poet and a description 

 of the civilized mind ; and the first discover of a gold nugget 

 possibly viewed it as a sort of substitute for a bead or a shell 

 for a necklace. Even to this day, there are peoples who do not 

 esteem gold, and will give nothing for it. The various British 

 and Egyptian Soudan expeditions were compelled to take along 

 with them bulky Maria Theresa dollars, because the Arab would 

 not take gold in exchange. The taste of the Arab is for silver 

 ornaments. He is no fanatical silver man desirous of seeing 

 silver remonetised. Gold he could not, or at least was not 

 accustomed to, use as ornaments for his person, his horse, or his 



