OUR RULERS' INTENTIONS 103

to keep the City's back premises clean; because
insanitary conditions in the back yard raise a stink
which fouls the whole City.

In the meantime, if gossip is to be believed, some
of the members of the Government have the most
disquieting intentions concerning the kind of regula-
tions which they wish to impose on the activities of
the City, especially in its financial branch. It is
believed that some of the bright young gentlemen
who now rule us are in favour of Government control
over the investment of money placed at home, and
the prohibition of the issue of foreign securities;
and it is even whispered that a fantastic scheme for
controlling the profits of all industrial companies, by
which anything earned above a certain level is to be
seized for the benefit of the nation, is now a fashion-
able project in influential Parliamentary circles.
Every one must, of course, admit that a certain
amount of control will be necessary for some time
after the war. It may not be possible at once to
throw open the London Money Market to all
borrowers, leaving, them and it to decide between
them who is to be first favoured with a supply of
the capital for which there will be so large a demand
when the war is over. Certain industries, those
especially on which our export trade depends, will
have to be first served in the matter of the provision
of capital. If it is a choice between the engineering
or shipbuilding trades and a company that wants to
start an aeroplane service between London and
Brighton for the idle rich, it would not be reasonable,
during the first few months after the war, that the