As we spoke of the Bank of England becoming temporarily rich, by the accumulation of revenue early in the year, so it becomes, as a rule, poor in the autumn. People are getting more used to this ebb and flow in Threadneedle Street, and the trouble it caused when Mr. Lowe first begun experimenting is not now experienced to the same extent; but still it is one of the elements which is disadvantageous, and to be kept in view by the speculator as a regularly recurring adverse influence. It is, of course, of the last importance to keep a watch over the foreign exchanges, as these are affected more or less at certain periods when the imports and exports of special kinds of produce and manufactures are active. Other influences which occur with machine-like regularity will be referred to as occasion may require, and we now proceed to go more into detail. [Sidenote: ACTIVITY AMONG BUYERS.] [Sidenote: THE BULL SPECULATOR’S GREAT CHANCE.] [Sidenote: THE GREAT IMPORTANCE OF BEING NOW AND AGAIN ALTOGETHER CLEAR OF THE MARKETS.] [Sidenote: THE MOVEMENT OF PRICES NEAR THE SETTLEMENTS.] We will take activity among buyers:—It is clear that active buying in any market arises from a strong demand from persons who desire to purchase for reasons known to themselves. A strong _bona fide_ demand for securities means that the public is making money, as they do not enter the Stock markets as _bona fide_ purchasers, unless they have surplus monies which they desire to invest and put by in the form of savings. Now, a speculator who is watching for an opportunity to buy should keep in view one set of circumstances as favourable to his operations in the same way that a seller should watch for an opposite combination of causes as favourable for speculative sales. A bull speculator should know that his great opportunity occurs after securities generally have been driven down in price by a severe commercial crisis, which has compelled holders of stocks upon a large scale to realize. In other words, when prosperity is beginning to revive after a prolonged stagnation, and the prices of stocks are very low, the bull speculator’s great chance occurs. When the great industries of a nation seem to rise as from the grave, and where lifelessness and inactivity ruled before the blows of the hammer resound and the blast furnace roars, a new life springs through the arteries of the commercial system, and the result is a rise in public securities. The solid rise in the price of stocks is that caused by the hard money-buying by a public that is well to do. At such a time the bull speculator should be in the van, for then the golden harvest prepared for his special sickle invites the reaper. Every trade gets its turn to a certainty. We will say, during a period of prosperity, a general recovery of the sounder stocks to a level at which they yield on the money invested 4½ per cent. per annum, takes two years from the time the advance had fairly set in.