Page:Stephen Graham - Russia in 1916 (1917).djvu/111

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Significance of Trade Figures

her products—that Britain can obtain for her and it will be for the health of Russia and of the world. In return we shall send much to Russia, but not haphazard and not shoddy dump, I hope.

Russian trade of all kinds is in a bad way just now and it is a trying time for Russian merchants—especially when they read frequently in their newspapers "Britain's Record Month of Trade," and the like. I think these joyful telegrams about our trade should be accompanied by an explanatory note to the effect that the greater part of that so-called trade is a matter of war materials and necessities. The figures really represent our tremendous activity in the Allied cause. War is a material waste, and every moment it is prolonged we lose heavily materially; and in this material sense we lose more than Russia loses. We have had more to lose. Our trade figures represent the height of our temperature in the war-fever.

Russia is suffering internally through the

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