The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1919-04-23
AFRAID GERMANS WILL GET OFF
 TOO EASILY

Paris, Aprl 23.-tCorrespondenc of The Associated Press) - "I am afraid the Peace Conference Is going to let the Boches off too easily" said Professor Louis Dubois, deputy for the department of the Seine to the Associated Press today. Professor Du- bois has made a special study of the economic situation in northern France produced by the destructive ingenuity of the Germans. He has submitted 10 the Chamber of De pudes a -ailed report of his fnd- ings.
 Are the Germans 70 be spared?" he asked. With their industries un- impaired they will have seized the markets Ions before we are ready to compete with them. If only Presi- dent Wilson would come and see with his own eyes what utter ruin and de- struction they have brought upon our unhappy land.
 ''One has to see the destruction with ones own eyes, he went on. Much has been cleaned up already. With devilish ingenuity the Germans made a speciality of destroying the essential things. They even had a machine specially devised to destroy railway points. General GassOuius who com mands the northern section, told me that it will take two years before the railway system is in proper working orCor again.
 .Transportation is fnterIocked with all the big difficulties we have to cope with. There is the question of raw materials and the question of la Dor. If, by demobilization, we get fn places where they are needed. Then we must house and feed them. There is neither food nor housing accom- notation To provide 1t, we again need transportation
 we are asked why we cannot make fuller use of the canals but these canals served as lines. of de- fense for the enemy. Their banks are battered, they are full of debris and need dredging. Many of the locks are destroyed.
 "The pits of the coal mining dis trict are flooded in places. One or two may be worked partly in six to eight months but it will be five or six years before the mines are in proper working condition again. Where are we to find the miners? The country around is razed and de- yastated to a degree of which people have not the faintest idea. There IS not q, house left standing in Lens. How are we to lodge and feed a min iue. population ana how are we to re- gain our pre-war output of 20,00C 900 tons of coal a year which ev' 2 tben. did not cover our home needs2'
 Asked if France was recovering any of the textile, metal manufactur- ing or sugar refining machinery 9tol- len bv the Germans, he replied Lat 1t was diFicuI to transport it and most of the French plants were not yet ready to receive it. ''I know cases of Germans approa ching the original owners of machinery and offering to sell them back their own property -hev had stolen from them" he said.
 'rThen there is the agricultural cuestion.'' he continued. ''The arabic soil in these parts is only ten inches deep. Beneath it is a, sub-soii of bar ren chalk. The good soil that grows wheat-where is it? The farmers will have to begin right from the be- ginning again, a3 the squatters did III America; that is, they will have to preoare the soil for cultivation. La bor and transp ortation again! Not in fifteen or twenty years will that soli produce anything in the way Of fooo grain