He bought her a gilt brooch.
A failed gilt auction, in particular, could send sterling tumbling.
In Britain, gilt yields have fallen to their lowest level since the Victorian era.
Mr Islam reckons overseas investors have been buying around 30% of recent gilt issuance.
The screen was an old one, of gilt Spanish leather, stamped and wrought with a rather florid louis-Quatorze pattern.
London's most prominent publishers made very good money with this system, some driving around the city in gilt carriages.
There is plenty to see inside – including gilt palanquins and bejewelled daggers – but it is the view of the city spread out below that is sublime.
Walls and woodwork in shades of dark blue are set against a gilt-framed mirror, a leopard-print rug and a settee upholstered in gold fabric.
She coursed, coiffed and high-heeled, through rooms filled with marble coffee tables, gilt-framed armoires and fields of Persian carpets.
That is vital; if gilt yields were to rise sharply it could lead to a vicious circle of rising debt-servicing costs and higher debt.
Our room was large and warm, with a Bechstein grand and a theatrical gilt mirror that hung at an ominous 45-degree angle over the bed.
Then began one of those pointless social conversations so common in American resorts where the would-be gilded attempt to rub off gilt from those who have it in abundance.
The walls were covered with gilt-framed mirrors, and by the door were two brass tubs—one filled with fresh linen towels and the other with a pile of the same towels, already soiled.
Then he, whose armour was inlaid with gilt flowers, and on whose helmet crouched a lion that had wings, held up a shield, and cried, 'How saith my Lord that he is not beautiful?'
It was as if the skies, taking pity on their nakedness, had draped their majestic shoulders in imperial purple, while at this hour the westering sun tipped their pinnacles with gilt.
