24 MODERN MONETARY SYSTEMS 
anyone desiring to sell silver on the London market at a 
price considerably higher than that given by the legal ratio 
of the Latin Union would have elicited the following reply 
from an intending purchaser : “I shall import it at my own 
expense ; in the end it will be cheaper.” Thus the possi- 
bility of drawing on the stocks of bimetallist countries 
fixed a maximum price for silver, at any rate so long as 
these stocks did not approach a point of exhaustion. 
Conversely, during the same period anyone holding silver 
who was offered a price for his bullion considerably lower 
than that given by the legal ratio could reply: “At your 
price I should prefer to take it to a mint, in Paris or 
Brussels, for instance.” And this reply held good so long as 
there was vacant space in the mints. 
A decisive influence on price stability must therefore have 
necessarily been exerted by the limits imposed by Bimetallism 
upon the conditions of the silver marke:. 
Hence the following observations may be made at once 
without attempting to draw all the theoretical conclusions 
which in our view follow from the experience of 1gth- 
century Bimetallism. 
Contrary to the expectations of the legislators of the 
year XI, it was possible for nearly three-quarters of a 
century to maintain the legal ratio between gold and silver 
without modification in France and without important 
changes in other bimetallist countries. Internally, there 
was never a moment when a 20-franc louis could not be 
exchanged for four silver crowns. Moreover, even outside 
bimetallist countries and in particular in London where 
the world market for silver was situated, the value of silver 
expressed in terms of gold only oscillated very slightly 
about the point given by the legal French ratio. Thus, in 
the light of the above considerations, the facts show 
that the silver market was strangled by bimetallism ; and 
the right of the public authorities to fix the respective 
prices of the two chief monetary metals began to be 
exercised at the very moment when they thought proper 
to abandon the attempt. 
It may be added that the monetary legislation of France