from one to another, bestows affluence here and
embarrassment there, and redistributes Fortune's
favors so as to frustrate design and disappoint
expectation.

The fluctuations in the value of money since
1914 have been on a scale so great as to constitute,
with all that they involve, one of the most signifi-
cant events in the economic history of the modern
world. The fluctuation of the standard, whether
gold, silver, or paper, has not only been of un-
precedented violence, but has been visited on a
society of which the economic organization is more
dependent than that of any earlier epoch on the
assumption that the standard of value would be
moderately stable.

During the Napoleonic Wars and the period im-
mediately succeeding them the extreme fluctuation
of English prices within a single year was 22 per
cent; and the highest price level reached during
the first quarter of the nineteenth century, which
we used to reckon the most disturbed period of
our currency history, was less than double the
lowest and with an interval of thirteen years.
Compare with this the extraordinary movements
of the past nine years. To recall the reader's
mind to the exact facts, I refer him to the table
on the next page.

I have not included those countries-- Russia,
Poland, and Austria--where the old currency has

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