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Citizens of the United States don't invest a lot of time thinking about the shade of green ink used to print their currency. Go ahead, pull one out of your wallet, we'll wait. If you're not an American citizen and still hold U.S. currency in your wallet, well, thank you for the loan. You probably don't think much about ink shades on your currency, either. (Unless you're from Norway. In that case, congratulations, kroner are the most aesthetically gorgeous currency designs on our planet, and pretty darn solid, too.) A close examination of a U.S. paper note actually reveals two shades of green ink. On the front side of a U.S. $1 bill, the serial number on the left and the seal of the Department of the Treasury on the right are printed in a bright, jewel-like shade of green. The back side, however, is printed in an entirely different, swampy, blackish green. U.S. dollars are not the most attractive of currencies, but they certainly bear a consistent, reliable, comforting shade of black-green. Who do you think supplies that black-green ink to the U.S. Treasury? Or the color-shifting black-to-green ink featured on newer, pricier U.S. currency notes? You have no idea, and neither do I, and there are good reasons for that. My bet, though, is that it is not Nathan Tardif of Noodler's Ink, who has an entire line of inks that mock the U.S. Federal Reserve, and it's not Diamine, either. Diamine is British, and it would be pretty silly for the U.S. Treasury to outsource one of the key ingredients in the stability of its currency to a bunch of limeys. Nothing against the British, but we doubt if the British government asks Yankee crackers for help with its currency, either. Which brings us to the subject of this review, which is a British fountain pen ink called Diamine Emerald Green. This ink warrants a couple of American observations. First, it's much more vegetal than jewel-like. It's more like the back side of a U.S. dollar note than the front. To use other great green American icons, Diamine Emerald Green is more like sequoia trees, National Parks, and the U.S. Forest Service than it is like the navigational signs on U.S. interstate highways. It is definitely not like the Emerald City in the Wizard of Oz. Another observation: this ink dries blazingly fast. On a sheet of Hewlett-Packard 32-pound laserjet paper, it's totally dry in 4 seconds. If you're left-handed, or if you're one of the members of the British secret service who supposedly write spy notes in green ink, you should really consider Diamine Emerald Green. It won't besmirch your hands and will save you oodles of time. Also, it doesn't do any of that fickle color-shifting sheeny stuff. And, last observation, it's an unbelievably well-behaved, polite, reserved, modest ink; exhibiting virtually no bleedthrough or showthrough at all. The holder of a fountain-pen-wielding member of the green-ink brigade who writes crazy conspiracy-theory letters to British newspaper editors could well imagine the ink saying, "Dry now, sir. We certainly want to ensure that you can fit many more words on the other side of your paper. If that's all, sir, I will make tea." Scanned Ink Review Document - Diamine Emerald Green (If this scan appears jewel-like on your computer monitor, it was intercepted and altered by the British secret service.) The Pen Used to Ink This Review -- a Jinhao 599