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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.— SUPPLEMENT. 



But gold is riches, and riches supply every kind 

 of necessaries and of comforts. Gold, we an- 

 swer, is not riches till it is made use of by being 

 parted with ; that is all the good which can be 

 obtained from it, unless it is applied in the arts 

 to gold ornaments. Gold exchanges commodities 

 — enables a manufacturer to procure coals in re- 

 turn for his cloth. But the gold itself, and by 

 itself, confers no other benefit whatever than its 

 services as a tool. Germany would have been 

 most truly and permanently the richer for the 

 French gold had she given it away to foreign 

 countries in the purchase of their wealth ; it 

 would have brought what her people wanted into 

 the country. But Germany could get no gain 

 by obtaining gold solely to move German things 

 about. 



Then it is believed that a considerable por- 

 tion of this French gold has been hoarded as a 

 reserve against future war. That gold does noth- 

 ing to clear away the commercial depression; it 

 sets no mills to work, gives employment to no 

 laborers, imports no supplies of corn, meat, cof- 

 fee, aud clothing for the people, or raw materials 

 for their industry ; it is idle, and absolutely no 

 better than if it were non-existent. 



But there is another portion of this French 

 gold, of wnich there is yet worse to tell. Its ac- 

 tion is full of instruction, especially for the city, 

 if the city were only willing to gather it up. The 

 German Governments were embarrassed with the 

 excess of this metallic stock, and lent much of it 

 to traders and speculators. To what better pur- 

 pose could they have applied it? it will be asked. 

 To none, but upon one condition — that it should 

 be sent out of Germany. Its export would have 

 placed in Germany useful things, in the place of 

 useless tools for exchanging, of which there were 

 already enough. But, by being retained in Ger- 

 many, and lent to borrowers, it not only was un- 

 productive of all good, but was really engender- 

 ing mischief peculiarly its own. The borrowers 

 took to buying German goods ; prices rose in the 

 shops and warehouses all over the country ; prof- 

 its were realized, and wages gained advances ; 

 and then the evil consequences soon appeared 

 upon the scene. An increase of spending broke 

 out all round ; there was money in hand ; it was 

 applied to buying things pleasant and enjoyable. 

 A higher style of living was adopted ; in other 

 words, a larger and more rapid consumption of 

 wealth prevailed. And what was obtained in ex- 

 change ? The gold, which did not restore the 

 wealth consumed, but only transferred existing 

 things from one set of hands to another. Did 



not the humorist stand on the ground of solid 

 sense when he exclaimed, " Let us have another 

 war, and let the Germans have to pay the in- 

 demnity ? " Had he not the acuteness to per- 

 ceive that, if much harm is to be averted, the 

 sooner an excess of gold is sent out of the coun- 

 try the better ? Let those who bewail exports 

 of gold, and record its imports with delight, pon- 

 der over his words and the facts that elicited 

 them. 



If, now, we turn our eyes to France, how dif- 

 ferent and how startling is the picture which pre- 

 sents itself to our gaze ! Here we were bound to 

 expect the sight of acute suffering, financial de- 

 pression, stagnation of trade, poverty, and mis- 

 ery. The war had been infinitely more oppres- 

 sive to France than to Germany, for it had been 

 waged within her territory. She had lost two valu- 

 able provinces and their resources at its termina- 

 tion. A fine of unheard-of magnitude had been 

 imposed and paid. Thirty additional millions of 

 taxation had been added to a budget already se- 

 vere. Much of the fixed capital of the nation, of 

 its factories and machinery, had been destroyed 

 or injured by the war. Where could ruin and 

 depression be more naturally looked for ? Yet 

 what a spectacle does France offer to the ob- 

 server ! The piled-up load of taxation is borne 

 with ease. Her industry is iu full play. No 

 sense of poverty weighs down the people. Her 

 army is undergoing a thorough and successful 

 transformation ; guns and military stores — what 

 they cost in these days is known to all — are 

 swiftly being accumulated. Great has been the 

 astonishment at Berlin. Eighteen months ago a 

 violent scare sprang up in that town ; the con- 

 queror fell into vehement fear of the conquered. 

 Germany awoke from her dream of security. The 

 great military chiefs loudly called for a second 

 war to break up an enemy whom neither defeat 

 nor chastisement could crush. To what was this 

 most unlooked-for and most astounding sight 

 due ? To the practice of one of the very great- 

 est of economical virtues. She had saved. Her 

 eight millions of peasant-proprietors had lifted 

 their country out of the depths of adversity by 

 invigorated energy and reduced consumption. If 

 more had to be paid to the tax-gatherer, the peas- 

 ant gave up meat or other indulgences rather 

 than diminish his means of maintaining his farm 

 or his vineyard at its former level of efficiency. 

 No doubt France obtained very valuable aid from 

 the inveterate hoarding of her people. Then it 

 was that stores of gold could do vital service. 

 They had lain buried in hidden stockings, useless 



