roubles. They preferred to be deprived of profits and interest on their money, if only they could have more money in safety.
The State tried reprisals. It was decided that for railway tickets it was necessary to pay in gold. But that led to riots; for the gold was hoarded by the rich, while the majority of the travellers were middle-class people, workers and peasants. In order to pay for their tickets they had to run everywhere for gold pieces and to pay exorbitant prices for them. After a short time the demand had to be withdrawn. Equally ineffective were the attempts to coerce the private banks and the private clients of the State Bank. Thus it came about that just before the Revolution and for some time afterwards the highest bank note in circulation was practically 25 roubles. And practically all payments had to be made in 10, 5, and 3 rouble notes. Imagine large sums amounting to thousands of roubles being paid in 3-rouble notes! This created an enormous economic difficulty, which was moreover considerably augmented owing to the very meagre development of the cheque system in Russia.
When all this is said, is there any need to dwell specially on the state of mind of the people and the soldiers? It was certainly very gloomy. The soldiers, being half-slaves, received nothing—a mere few pence per month. Their wives and children actually died of hunger and cold on the poor separation allowances made to soldiers' dependents. And the workers themselves received beggarly wages.[1] Yet all the time the country was swamped with millions. Joint-stock companies and banks issued new stocks, doubling and trebling their capital. Rumours ran from end to end of the country, telling of legendary incomes and
- ↑ The enormous rise in wages after the Revolution is to a great extent explained by the truly beggarly wages during the war. The excessive demands of the workers are made to appear still more stupendous by comparing them with the beggarly pre-revolutionary wages.
