Practically every man of military age throughout the vast empire is either fighting or training. Before the war many had used influence to avoid military service, had obtained medical exemption on the slightest grounds. But there has been a thorough revision, and large numbers have been recovered. You see the new troops marching and drilling on the open places of the large towns, in camps on the steppes, and as the train takes you through the country you see boy-Cossacks prancing about on their ponies and practising with their lances. Russia is altogether in the war and for the war. She is doing her utmost. And her spirit is good. It is well English people should feel that to-day. And from us should go out to this great people, suffering and struggling as we are, a great fellow-feeling of gratitude and generous affection. X RUSSIAN MONEY BEFORE the war for £10 you received 94 roubles, but now you receive 150. Last year after the great Russian retreat the exchange stood at over 160, but banks refused to give more than a nominal exchange. And in order to stop traffic abroad and foreign speculation in Russian money it was forbidden by law for any one to take more than 500 roubles out of the country. Now, however, the new value of the rouble seems to have been accepted, and banks generally give the due exchange value. Although the rouble has slightly improved it is not anticipated that the paper money will ever regain its guaranteed gold exchange. Each Russian note is in the form of a certificate that the State Bank will pay in exchange for it a certain quantity of gold. That certificate has little value to-day, and it is an open secret that the Government buys gold at a rate which assumes a lower value for the rouble. People who have hoards of gold coinage--and they are many in Russia, for the people are disinclined to use banks--are keeping their gold, and their action is justified by the privileges which are already accorded those who can pay the Government in coin. It is expected by many that at the end of the war the rouble will be assigned a lower gold value. One obvious effect of the depreciation of the rouble has been that all real estate and material belongings have increased in money value. If you have an estate worth 94,000 roubles before the war, it is now worth 150,000 roubles, and you are lucky if your fortune was in this comparatively more real form, of land. People, on the other hand, who were in debt have found the actual weight of the debt diminishing as money lost value. This has been particularly noticeable in the case of people who have mortgaged property. Suddenly it has been possible to sell the property at a high figure, pay off the debt, and still retain an unexpectedly large margin.