The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1916-12-27

almost under. Mt. Blanc, the most ancient and the: most modern shell factories in Europe are night and day pounding out munitions for the French cannon on the Somme.
 At Allevard, where steel has been made since the time of the. Romans,@l saw a water power forge yesterday which has been in operation for over 800 years, fand a few miles away, at Ugines, the most modern electric steel plant in existence, just complet- ed. Both were hammering out shells.
 The old shell forge at Allevard is the most vivid recollection l have after trailing through half a hundred :. war factories in this part of France. It is operated directly by water power, a mountain stream turning a big drum around a shaft.
 As it turns the drum it lifts and drops the old trip hammer, the ham mer itself shaping shell that turns beneath it. The trip hammer was built by it's fancifu1 constructor cen turies ago to resemble the head of a horse, and it appears to be, biting at the steel.
 As the water paddles on the drum are unevenly separated the horse head makes few dignifed drops on the shell, and then, starting to gallop, pounds furiously at the shell, throw ing it to cool in a passion of fury
 Feed on .sWhite Coal.",
 It was fascinating to watch, partic- ularly as the two old men who tended it were entirely under it's spell I suggested to the nearest that it was an archaic contrivance for modern war.
 we are making them just the same" he said. Big ones. too. Noth- ing less than 155 longs, with a range i, of eightf, miles. Look lat that shell. ! With all their.na naodern machinery, they l are not turning out anything better i than that" S..a - v
 The war factories are accumulat- { ing in this part of France on account of the water power. They are what we would call hydro-electric plants. ! The Savyards say.s more poetically, they feed on the. white coal"
 The one at Ugines is. the last word in. the use of ,hydro-electric power. Every operation in the big steel mills is performed by electricity, from the melting of the steel to the cranes that load. the. shells into the trains.
 Creusot, the most famous French artillery factory, looks like a Pitts , burg rolling mill The whole place is grfmy with soft coal and noisy.
 But Ugfnes is clean and, except for the actual pounding of electric ham mers, almost noiseless. It was built by Paul Girod, a French engineer. known by all steel men for his suc- cess with electric furnaces. :.
 K American Steel the Best.
 The yards were piled high with steel bars all bearing an American mark .s
 ESQ that's. where. you s-get your steel g~ I said to Paul Girod who was showing me through.
 a"Every bit of it for these big shells,'' said Girod. "It is the best there is. .'' He told me American steel had . been used in the high power artillery { and ammunition since before the war. There are certain varieties of Penn sy1vania steel which, he said. are not to, be equalled.
 That phrase, "aH thew or1d is fighting our valiant soldiers" which
 
 has been using nearly every day since the Somme offensive began, is not without foundation, as one can see in the factories here. /
 Large bodies of laborers from ;neu- %tral Spain and Greece are working in the factories here. Coolie labor from Southern China has also been intro duced, though I have not seen any, Negroes from Africa. Tunisians whose \ red tarbushes are rarely seen north of Marsedlles, even Lascars are to be found in the mountain war factories. Labor From All Lands.
 France is having taste of import ed labor bring in segregated colonies such as the United States has known for regeneration, For the most part they get along pretty well together, but the introduction of 5000 Portu- guese laborers has caused trouble.
 The Portuguese are intensely proud of the fact that they are belligerents, and they like particularly to taunt the Greeks I just missed seeing g. pitch ed battle between the Portuguese and Greeks at. ..Domene,i a factory town near here, and arrived only in time to see the Greeks, a<body of 1 50, be- ing moved off to another factory town under. the protection of the eeudarmes.
 For five days I have been trailing through shell factories until I am tired of looking at them. And I have seen only a small fraction of the shell factories in France.
 There are two on my own street in Paris. One turns out 5e,0oO shells a day. They are being made every where in this country
 Factories making 10.000, 25,0eO, 10000 shells a day cannot get a sit down and begin to figure up their total production.
 feel quite sure day does not go by that France makes less than 100000 shells. should not be sur prised to hear that it's production were 2,oO0,000 day. It is making shells not only for itself, but for Italy Serbia, Rumania and Russia
 Guns of 1870.
 A weeks visit in shell factories makes it apparent that France is still using in large numbers artillery built 20 to SC years ago. Howitzers built in the '70s, which used to be in fort resses, are being dragged about by tractors, and, though they are not as good as modern guns, are keeping the Germans back.