There are times when it is to the advantage of the banker or merchant to ship gold to meet foreign debts. Usually if sight bills on England cost more than 4.90 it is cheaper to ship gold. The following figures give some particulars of the cost of such shipments: Freight - 1/8 of one per cent. Insurance - 1/8 of one per cent. Abrasion - From nothing to 1/8 of one per cent on $20-pieces; 1/8 per cent to 1/4 Per cent on $10-pieces, and 1/4 per cent, to 1/2 per cent on $5-pieces.

The cost of bringing gold from London to New York is the same as the cost from New York to London. The actual demand for gold in either city will affect its value slightly, and this temporary value must be ascertained before making close figures on a large transaction.

The World's Financial Center. There is no doubt of the fact that London is the financial center of the world. This tendency to the centralization of financial business in London is much promoted by the fact that the largest mass of cheap loanable capital exists there. The general rate of interest in New York is at least 3 per cent higher than in London, so that a trader who has credit enough to obtain loans in London will make a profit by borrowing there rather than in New York city. The great banks of the world each of which is a center for its own section of country must have a general center for clearings and London has grown to be this center. The great foreign trade of England, her thousands of carrying ships, her merchants and investments in every country on the globe, the age and strength of her great financial institutions, and the many distant colonies and dependencies which naturally have financial relations with the capital of the empire, tend to give London the unique position which is rightfully hers. Lombard and Threadneedle streets are the great money streets of London, as Wall street is of New York.