THE UNITED STATES, I. UNTIL 1900 285 
situation is not quite so beclouded. After the Californian gold 
discoveries, that metal was produced in abundance from the 
domestic mines. Most of it flowed abroad. It was an article of 
export, and had to be paid for in some way or other; it contributed 
its share to the then persisting excess of merchandise imports. Yet 
the gold was virtually an article of export, and the immediate 
cause of its movement from time to time was in the balance of in- 
ernational payments; and this balance on occasions was such as to 
bring about an actual inflow, and at other occasions caused the 
outflow to be less than usual. Monetary and banking conditions 
ere then less chaotic than in preceding years; and the whole inter- 
lacing system of money, credit, prices, was clearly of the sensitive 
type. An attempt to trace the influence of the international move- 
ment of gold, or more accurately of the greater or less outflow of 
gold, might therefore seem not entirely hopeless. But these years 
of comparative clarity were few; and they were dominated by the 
great expansion which preceded the crisis of 1857, and by the de- 
pression following it. It is possible that an elaborate study of this 
one decade would yield results of significance toward testing the 
Ricardian theory of the relation between gold movements and 
prices. But the information on the pertinent matters is frag 
mentary, and at best the period is short. Even after painstaking 
sifting of the evidence, the direct effects of gold movements on 
credit and prices would probably remain obscure, and the long- 
run trends in the relations between domestic and foreign prices still 
more So. 
After the Civil War, the national banking system brought about 
greater uniformity in the banking and credit situation. True, great 
banks were active outside the system, were unaffected by the fed- 
eral legislation, and went their own way. As regards those within 
the system as well as those without, the structure of credit and 
money remained a sensitive one, as it had been before. But during 
the period from the close of the war to the resumption of specie 
payments — that is, from 1865 to 1879 — it was sensitive in other 
ways, and under the influence of other forces than is contemplated 
in the familiar theories of gold movements. The ordinary circu-