Somewhat better was Marshall’s novel concept of symmetallism (Marshall 1887, 204-7). It abolished gold coin in favor of a money supply consisting wholly of banknotes convertible into gold and silver ingots joined together in fixed physical proportions. Unlike bimetallism, in which the gold price of silver is set at the mint, symmetallism would not degenerate into monometallism. Instead, the market would determine the relative price of the two metals so that both could remain in the reserve base. Another advantage of symmetallism was that it abolished coin, which meant that gold and silver could be withdrawn from circulation where they were no longer needed and placed in the country’s metallic reserve. With this enlarged buffer-stock reserve, the country could weather external gold-and-silver drains and the resulting crises without being forced into violent, deflationary contractions of the banknote money supply.