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is  inclined  to  purchase.  Such  a  firm  will  also
inform  him  as  necessity  arises  how  all  his
stocks  are  valued  on  those  Stock  Exchanges
on  which  they  are  principally  dealt  in.
If  the  question  of  what  people  think  of
stocks  and  what  they  consider  safe  is  analysed,
we  come  again  to  a  point  of  geography  pure
and  simple.  A  Swede  will  consider  Swedish
the  safest  National  Loans,  and  an  American
will  entertain  a  preference  for  those  of  the
United  States.  The  Scotchman  will  prefer  the
British  Linen  Company  Bank  to  the  London  &
Westminster,  the  Londoner  vice  versa.  If  an
Englishman  were  told  to  buy  the  Austrian
North  Railway  Debentures  he  would  hesitate,
while  an  Austrian  might  consider  London
&  North  Western  Debentures  to  be  highly
speculative.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  both  these
debentures  are  equally  safe,  as  can  be  proved
by  statistics  ;  therefore,  why  should  an  investor
allow  local  feeling  to  interfere  with  his
obtaining  investment  safety  ?
When  the  various  Stock  Exchanges  of  the
world  are  reviewed,  and  when  we  consider  that
each  Stock  Exchange  deals  in  quite  a  number
of  stocks  which  have  only  a  very  limited,  if
any,  market  in  other  countries,  yet  which  stand
high  in  the  estimation  of  local  investors,  wß  see
more  clearly  how  wide  may  become  the  area  of