led
a veritable maelstrom of activity. From a diet of cereal and
fruit-whips, he is turned loose in the butler's pantry among the
maraschino cherries and given a free rein at the various children's
parties, where individual pound-cake Santas and brandied walnuts are
followed by an afternoon at "Treasure Island," with the result that he
comes home and insists on tipping every one in the family the black
spot and breaks the cheval glass when he is denied going to the six-day
bicycle race at two in the morning.

* * * * *

Little girls do practically the same, and, if they are over fourteen, go
back to school with the added burden of an _affaire de coeur_ contracted
during the recess. In general, it takes about a month or two of good,
hard schooling and overstudy to put the child back on its feet after the
Christmas rest at home.

* * * * *

Which leads us to the conclusion that our educational system is all
wrong. It is obvious that the child should be kept at home for eight
months out of the year and sent to school for the vacations.

XXXI

HOW TO UNDERSTAND INTERNATIONAL FINANCE

It is high time that someone came out with a clear statement of the
international financial situation. For weeks and weeks officials have
been rushing about holding conferences and councils and having their
pictures taken going up and down the steps of buildings. Then, after
each conference, the newspapers have printed a lot of figures showing
the latest returns on how much Germany owes the bank. And none of it
means anything.

Now there is a certain principle which has to be followed in all
financial discussions involving sums over one hundred dollars. There is
probably not more than one hundred dollars in actual cash in circulation
today. That is, if you were to call in all the bills and silver and gold
in the country at noon tomorrow and pile them up on the table, you would
find that you had just about one hundred dollars, with perhaps several
Canadian pennies and a few peppermint life-savers. All the rest of the
money you hear about doesn't exist. It is conversation-money. When you
hear of a transaction involving $50,000,000 it means that one firm wrote
"50,000,000" on a piece of paper and gave it to another firm, and the
other firm took it home and said "Look, Momma, I got $50,000,000!" But
when Momma asked for a dollar and a quarter out of it to pay the man wh