[11] A _turn_ which even a Polish Chancellor of the Exchequer might envy. [12] In the second week of November the mark fell to 1300 to the paper pound, recovering a day or two later (Wednesday, November 9) to 980. The real difference between the present monetary conditions and the American _continentals_, or the French assignats, is a difference not of kind, but of degree and extent. The causes and the consequences, the motives of those who work the mint, the ruin and demoralization of the victims, the effects upon public and private debts and credit are the same. But a whole continent populated by four hundred millions of people is concerned. The commercial and moral fabric of European civilization is tottering. Three years have passed since the war ended; but the currencies and exchanges of Europe are in a much worse condition than when peace was being negotiated. At the end of June, 1921, I walked from my office in the Strand down to Messrs. Hands & Co., who deal in foreign money at Charing Cross. On the way I passed the shop of a tailor, who had placarded on his shop window the announcement that he would give a hundred thousand roubles to every customer who bought a suit of clothes from him. He added that at the pre-war rate of exchange the one hundred thousand roubles would be worth ten thousand pounds. He did not add that they were at that time worth only two shillings.[13] On arriving at my destination, I asked to see specimens of the most debased currencies and eventually laid out ten shillings,[14] or, to be exact, 9_s_/10_d_. Here is the bill: Ten German marks cost me one shilling A hundred Austrian crowns cost me one and sixpence A hundred Polish marks cost me sixpence Twenty-five Russian (_Czar_)[15] roubles (1909) cost me sixpence Two Italian lire cost me eightpence Two Greek drachmas cost me eightpence Two Roumanian lei cost me sixpence Five Yugoslav dinars[16] cost me one shilling Ten Czechoslovakian crowns cost me one shilling Five Bulgarian levas cost me sixpence Five Finnish marks cost me one shilling Five Esthonian marks cost me one shilling Five Latvian roubles cost me sixpence [13] A month or two later they were not worth a shilling. The Russian Soviet Government was offering two hundred thousand roubles for one pre-war silver rouble! [14] Two dollars. [15] Twenty-five Soviet roubles would have been dear at a farthing. [16] On this note is stamped 20 _Kruna_ to indicate that five dinars exchanged for twenty Austrian crowns.