12 THE STATISTICAL VERIFICATION OF 
expect in particular industries. There is already avail- 
able a certain amount of statistical material—and we 
may reasonably hope that this material will both grow 
in quantity and improve in quality—from which students 
with the requisite mathematical equipment may make 
rough deductions about the shapes of certain supply 
schedules. On the side of demand something on these 
lines has already been accomplished. On the side of 
supply the task is undoubtedly more difficult. But we 
need not conclude that it is impossible. The hope of 
which I have just spoken, that better statistical material 
may presently be available for study, thus making the 
inquiry more feasible than it has been hitherto, should 
itself forbid that. There is indeed a lion in the path ; 
the fact that those people—with the towering exception 
of Jevons—who have the qualities required for conduct- 
ing a detailed intensive study of particular industries and 
writing monographs about them, are not usually well 
versed either in the more intricate parts of economic 
analysis or in modern statistical technique ; while the 
“analytics > lack alike capacity and inclination for these 
detailed studies. For this there is only one real remedy. 
We must endeavour to train up more men of the calibre 
of Jevons, who are equally at home in both fields. Till 
we can accomplish that, the next best thing, for those 
lesser persons who are moderately qualified for the one 
sort of inquiry and for the other, is to work together 
in combination, and not to waste time in quarrelling, 
perhaps on the basis of an imperfect understanding, with 
the deficiencies of one another’s methods.” Dr. Clapham 
retorts : 
‘I had anticipated that the facts and statistics 
demanded might be, by common consent, at present 
unprocurable ; but I had hoped that they might be 
specified. And now I am paid with a cheque drawn 
on the bank of an unborn Jevons. Can no one give us 
more current coin ?’