become more and more scarce. In the
midst of all this, various juggleries were tried, and in November, 1790,
the Assembly decreed a single standard of coinage, the chosen metal
being silver, and the ratio between the two precious metals was
changed from 15 1/2 to 1, to 14 1/2 to 1--but all in vain. It was found
necessary to issue the dreaded small paper, and a beginning was made by
issuing one hundred millions in notes of five _francs_, and, ere long,
obedient to the universal clamor, there were issued parchment notes for
various small amounts down to a single _sou_. [25]

Yet each of these issues, great or small, was but as a drop of cold
water to a parched throat. Although there was already a rise in prices
which showed that the amount needed for circulation had been exceeded,
the cry for "more circulating medium" was continued. The pressure for
new issues became stronger and stronger. The Parisian populace and the
Jacobin Club were especially loud in their demands for them; and, a few
months later, on June 19, 1791, with few speeches, in a silence very
ominous, a new issue was made of six hundred millions more;--less than
nine months after the former great issue, with its solemn pledges
to keep down the amount in circulation. With the exception of a few
thoughtful men, the whole nation again sang paeans. [26]

In this comparative ease of new issues is seen the action of a law
in finance as certain as the working of a similar law in natural
philosophy. If a material body fall from a height its velocity is
accelerated, by a well-known law, in a constantly increasing ratio: so
in issues of irredeemable currency, in obedience to the theories of a
legislative body or of the people at large, there is a natural law of
rapidly increasing emission and depreciation. The first inflation bills
were passed with great difficulty, after very sturdy resistance and by
a majority of a few score out of nearly a thousand votes; but we observe
now that new inflation measures were passed more and more easily and
we shall have occasion to see the working of this same law in a more
striking degree as this history develops itself.

During the various stages of this debate there cropped up a doctrine
old and ominous. It was the same which appeared toward the end of the
nineteenth century in the United States during what became known as the
"greenback craze" and the free "silver craze." In France it had
been refuted, a generation before the