y common and familiar method of
intercommunication.

These three interests--democratic, scientific, medical--seem at present
those chiefly concerned in the task of putting this matter on a definite
basis, and it is much to be desired that they should come to some common
agreement. They represent three immensely important modes of social and
intellectual activity, and the progress of every nation is bound up with
an international progress of which they are now the natural pioneers. It
cannot be too often repeated that the day has gone by when any progress
worthy of the name can be purely national. All the most vital questions
of national progress tend to merge themselves into international
questions. But before any question of international progress can result
in anything but noisy confusion, we need a recognized mode of
international intelligence and communication. That is why the question
of the auxiliary international language is of actual and vital interest
to all who are concerned with the tasks of social hygiene.

THE QUESTION ON INTERNATIONAL COINAGE

It must be remembered that the international auxiliary language is an
organic part of a larger internationalization which must inevitably be
effected, and is indeed already coming into being. Two related measures
of intercommunication are an international system of postage stamps, and
an international coinage, to which may be added an international system
of weights and measures, which seems to be already in course of
settlement by the increasingly general adoption of the metric system.
The introduction of the exchangeable international stamp coupon
represents the beginning of a truly international postal system; but it
is only a beginning. If a completely developed international postal
system were incidentally to deliver some nations, and especially the
English, from the depressingly ugly postage stamps they are now
condemned to use, this reform would possess a further advantage almost
as great as its practical utility. An international coinage is, again, a
prime necessity, which would possess immense commercial advantages in
addition to the great saving of trouble it would effect. The progress of
civilization is already working towards an international coinage. In an
interesting paper on this subject ("International Coinage," _Popular
Science Monthly_, March, 1910) T.F. van Wagenen writes; "Each in its
way, the great commercial nations of the day are unconsciou