ch soon dulled on the palate
in a rapidity of repetition:

It is Sunday afternoon, and on the pavement of a quiet street stands a
mute and gloomy man with an armful of what appears to be paper-money.
He is holding it out in his two hands.

Impossible that it should be money!

But it is. He is holding about half a million roubles in his hands.

Yes, they are for sale. This for so much, this other for so much.

"I am sorry I have no Greek money, but please take five liras Italian
and give it to your comrades. You must be very poor."

A smile appeared on the man's face.

"But you'll take some roubles," said he.

"Well, if you like, just a small note for remembrance. It doesn't
matter what."

"Here's ten thousand roubles!"

And he handed out a handsome new note for that amount. It fluttered
from his hand to the pavement and was caught on the wind.

"Pick it up quickly! It's ten thousand roubles," one wished to cry
anxiously to the passer-by.

Only ten thousand! And for something less than sixpence!

"Europe won't get right before the Russian business is straightened
out," said an American commercial traveller at the hotel. He, for his
part, was engaged in the profitless task of disposing of large margins
of goods at fifty per cent below cost of production whilst the
leisurely, crafty Greeks kept him waiting from day to day in the
expectation of getting another ten per cent reduction.

"The whole world's out of gear," said the American in disgust. "The
war and the Russian revolution are the cause. They have ruined the
meaning of money."

I was to find his words true to this extent that at every capital the
European problem proved to be inextricably involved in the Russian
problem also.

EXTRA LEAVES

(i) _On Passports and "Circulation"_

Mr. H. G. Wells, in "The Salvaging of Civilization," has very
pleasantly contrasted the States of America with the States of
Europe--the Disunited States. America, where you can travel by through
trains without showing passports, without customs-barriers, without
change of currency and without police-inquisition; America where there
is a free interchange of peoples and opinions, Europe lying in
unexampled obstruction and stagnation; America with its cheap post and
universally-used telephone service, Europe with its expensive,
ill-managed posts and local and limited and expensive and contumacious
telephone. At the time of writing you can send a letter