accounted for.

There were loans from the big banks of France for the government at the
opening of the war, but these loans I was assured were all merged in
the 5 per cent national-defense loans, which have not exceeding one
year to run.

On these national-defense loans the cautious Bank of France will
advance in limited amounts 80 per cent of the face value, but only
where the government loan matures within three months.

The great principle of the Bank of France is to keep liquid. Its
assets must always be mobile.

There is only one point at which French finance should be criticized,
and as we cannot know all the details of the stress of the military
position when Paris was abandoned, her mobilizing of the reserves still
in disorganization, and her transportation awry, we may not be in a
position to level any just criticism.

But it must be set down in the interest of true report that the French
credit was at one time endangered by the way the treasury, or the
military authorities, handled the government credit in payment for
war-supplies.

Instead of going to the bankers and making its financial arrangements,
paying the war-supply contractors, the French government made many
contracts under which it paid contractors, and purveyors, with the 6
per cent national-defense notes of the government, running three, six,
nine, and twelve months.