Go up and down the battle line in France and you get startling evidence of the French devotion to savings.  More than one English officer has told me of tearful requests from French peasants for permission to go back to their steel-swept and war-torn little farms to dig up the few hundreds of francs buried in some corner of field or garden.  Equally impressive is the sight of farmers—­usually old men and women—­working in the fields while shells shriek overhead and the artillery rumbles along dusty highways.

Thus the French war debt will be met because of the almost incredible saving power of the French people.  It is at once their pride and their prosperity.  When all is said and done, you discover that with nations as with individuals it is not what they make but what they save that makes them strong and enduring.

One afternoon last summer I talked in Paris with M. Alexandre Ribot, the French Minister of Finance:  a stately white-bearded figure of a man who looked as if he had just stepped out of a Rembrandt etching.  He sat in a richly tapestried room in the old Louvre Palace where more than one King had danced to merry tune.  Now this stately apartment was the nerve centre of a marvellous and close-knit structure that represented a real financial democracy.

“How long can France stand the financial strain of war?” I asked the Minister.

Light flashed in his eyes as he replied: 

“So long as the French people know how to save, and this means indefinitely.”

Although the invader has crossed her threshold, France continues to save.  Every wife in the Republic who is earning her livelihood while her husband is at the front (and nearly every man who can carry a gun is fighting or in training), is putting something by.  It means the building up of a future financial reserve against which the nation can draw for war or peace.

One rock of French economic solidity lies in her immense gold supply.  The per capita amount of gold is $30.02 and is larger than any other country in the world.  The United States is next with $19.39, after which come the United Kingdom with $18.28, and Germany $14.08.  Let me add, in this connection, that a good deal of the French gold is still in stocking and cupboard.

By the end of 1916 the war had cost France $11,000,000,000, which means an annual fixed charge of $600,000,000, to which must be added $200,000,000 for pensions, making the total fixed burden of $800,000,000.

All this cannot be paid out of savings, although in normal times France saves exactly $1,000,000,000 a year.  But the Government has one big trump card up its sleeve.  It is the large fortunes of her citizens.  They have been untouched by the war because practically no income tax has been levied.

While the average Frenchman will sacrifice his life rather than submit to taxation, the upper and wealthy class will do both.  The annual income of the people of France is $6,000,000,000.  Therefore a 12 per cent tax on this income would very nearly produce the entire fixed charge on the war debt.  France looks into the financial future unafraid.