The single
item of taxes was raised to six billion francs ($1,200,000), and these
taxes were paid to the penny, although ten million Frenchmen were
mobilized in the Army, in the factories, and on the farms, or were
untaxable in the occupied regions.
In 1915, 1916 and 1917 France raised three great national loans. That
of 1915 amounted to exactly 13,307,811,579 francs, 40 centimes, of
which 6,017 millions were paid in hard cash. That of October, 1916,
amounted in round numbers to ten billions francs, of which more than
five billions were paid in hard cash. That of December, 1917, amounted
to 10,629,000,000 francs, of which 5,254 millions were paid in cash.
Thus, in spite of the war, her invaded territories, and her mobilized
citizens, France has in three years raised three national loans of
almost seventeen billions francs in hard cash. That is three times the
amount of the war indemnity she paid Prussia in 1871.
A nation worn out and bled white has no more monetary reserve, no more
funds in its treasury, and has been brought into bankruptcy. The Bank
of France, which is probably the leading national bank in the world,
whose credit has never weakened in the gravest hours of the nation's
history, declared on the first of January, 1918, a gold reserve of
5,348 millions of francs, an increase of 272 millions over the gold in
hand on January first, 1917.
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