202 THE BALANCE OF INDEBTEDNESS, 1918-28 
and credits. The deficits as represented by the debit balances 
in 1920-1, 1923-4, and 1926-7 tell their own tale of the diffi- 
culties experienced in those years, and further elaboration will 
serve no useful purpose. 
If to these conditions we add the fluctuations in purchasing 
power owing to the normal seasonal character of primary pro- 
duction which again are transferred in a marked manner to the 
trading centres, we have an economic organization of a peculiar 
pattern, in which the activities of the great aggregations of 
population at the seaboard are responsive in a very delicate 
fashion to the prosperity of the back country. It is obvious that 
bhis arrangement tends to exaggerate in the capital ports the 
effects of expanding and contracting trade to an extraordinary 
degree. In the dependence of a large proportion of the popula- 
tion of the seaboard cities upon the activities of overseas trade, 
it is to be supposed, is to be found the chief reason for many of 
the recurrent seasonal problems which cannot be treated here. 
That they are, however, connected with the acceleration and 
retardation of capital supplies from overseas is undoubted, and 
the position is far from comfortable in many of its aspects. 
Tare XLIII 
The Commodity Balance of Trade, 1320-8 
(In Millions Sterling) 
DEBITS. 
Year. 
(919-20 
1920-21 
1921-22 
1922-23 
1923-24 
1924-25 
1926-26 
1926-27 
1927-28 
Commodity | 
imports. 
81-045 
143-078 
37-926 
116-633 
124-454 
130-186 | 
134-403 
146-253 
129-313 
Imports 
Jor 
re-export. | 
5-254 
5-387 
5-728 
3-119 
3-326 
3-088 
3-067 
2-989 
4-266 
Specie 
and 
bullion. 
0-046 
0-020 
0-043 
0-031 
0-062 
10-543 
0-421 
0-589 
1-008 
Imports 
of 
ships. 
0-038 
1-330 
+575 
2-133 
3-379 
)-268 
0-303 
0-213 
0-350 
Total 
Debits. 
86-373 
149-815 
98-272 
119-916 
128-220 
144-076 
138-194 
150-044 
134-937 
{ See in this connexion the remarks by D. H. Robertson: * With the partial closing 
of the vast gaps which existed in the nineteenth century between the comparative 
effectiveness of different countries in agriculture and industry respectively it is 
becoming natural that the world should settle down to a smaller relative volume 
of international trade. Yet fiction, prestige, tradition are all on the side of pushing 
loreign trade to its utmost limit. The result is the problem of “sheltered” and *‘un-