The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1920-04-05

 poration, 25 Beaver street, has just returned from a three months bus mess tour of Europe. In converse tdon with a repr esentative of The Journal of Comm cree recently MT. Kleinbaum said:
 That we are taking entirely too pessiTnistic view of Europe is my con- clusion after having spent the last three months visiting the principal commercial centters. Pessim1sIn be- comes a habit if too long allowed to dominate ones mind and the crash in exchanges which took place in Feb ruary was simply a climax to that frame Of mind of the American bus mess man. We seem to forget that nearly IS months have elapsed since the memorable November arnistice. In that time the people Of England, France, Belgium and even Italy and Germany have not been standing still.
 In England, where one finds the most comm ercially constructive Gov ernment in the world many very i'm portant changes have been taking place since the aTTnistice, hardly nio- ticed by most people. The old style English manufacturer is applying the lesson of large scale production which he learned during the war, and with the help of his Government is going keenly after business all over the world. And he is getting it, too, as is attested to by the fact that most of Engrand's prime industries such as the woolen and steel industries, are sold up for practically two years to come.
 While the present English Govern ment under Lloyd George leaves no stone unturned to promote English
 f1o,- saken the wartime extravagance Rather it had not until about three months ago when the House of Com mons refused to grant an apprOpria- tion as requested by the. Prime Min ister, for the first time since the be ginning, of the war. The measure it. self was unimportant but it served mo- tice that the British people were from now OF going to curb all undue iGovernment expenditure. This may be one reason why they are beginning to make gold shipments to us to pay off their debts rather than to renew the obligations.
 I happened to be at the American consuTs office the day Asquith left his Cavendish Square residence to take his seat in the House of Com mons for Paisley. The reception he received was unnistalable as the handwriting on the wall for Lloyd George. Asquith will undoubtedly play a very important role in the financial reconstruction of Engalnd. France has not been so fortunate in having as farsighted a government as the British. Clemenceam as war leader was superb, but the problems | of reconstruction were too much for him. The French people have slowly, lra a 2bHuIt T6l1lIll0ln2 1 their homes and their industries. l Lyons, St. Etenne, Grenoble, Bou- baix and even Lisle are booked with orders for at least two years. Trade with their colonies is fiouTishing and | the Frenchman is determined to re- gain his financial strength.
 othing showed this plainer than the election of M. Deschanel, instead l of the much-beIoved a-d admired Cleme enceau. The French people will ! never forget the Iatter's leadership to ultimate victory, but they also realize that he is not fitted to take up the fine financial problems which they now face When a Frenchman s1cri- fees sentiment for fact, there is much | to be optimistic about. M. Miherand | is regarded univ ersa;lly as a. man o1 extreme ability, and his influence is | already apparent in the last state ments of the Bank of France and the
 contraction of paper currency. Fur ther, while the French have always been magnificent in the face of an enemy, and unable to fight them selves, they are now realizing tina: l help must come to them from within and rot from without
 i Belgium is a real surprise. After four years of posters and propaganda and newspaper stories, one imagined 1 Belgium in ruins from end to end 1 Nothing is further from the truth. l traveled by motor from one end ot l Belgium to the other, from Courtra to Ghent, to Brussels. to Antwerp, tC l Liege Namur and Verviers. Greer 1 fields were seen everywhere, factO- 1 ries running to capacity in many dis 1 tricts, in others reconstructed and al most ready to resume operations
 Whatever damage was done was 1T | the extreme south and west, both in- dustrially unirnpOrtant.
 i Imm ediately after the aarnmshce | Belgium suffered from lack of labor because many of her men were luret 1 to France by high wages promised ib3 i the French government in some of | the districts where reconstruction was l going on. After paying all the incl l dental expenses, and suffering many | hardShipS, they found these hIgf
 wages snare and a delusion and SC | came back to their own country il ] large numbers. This has given ar | added impetus to industry and Bel 1 gium's production is increasing daily l High exchange rates have prevented | the purchase of all of the raw ma | teria1s they would like to buy tC
 bring their production up to higher levels, but I believe this will soon bC l overcome, as the Belgian franc i | selling far too cheap just now.
 Germany is in a very bad way. Yol 1 cannot buy any spot materials of an! 1 consequence and the factories are un | able to give either a firm price O.
 promise deliveries at any specified
 date, mainly due to lack of coal ant | inability to purchase raw material | Here again England is doing eXceIlen l work. Many English merchants ar, l sending raw materials to Germany t
 be manufactured and taking back tn l finished goods in payment This ob 1 viates the exchange situation, give the Germans work and allows then to accumulate a profit with which t
 start operating again. Incidentally
 the English are firmly capturing ol
 German trade connections with req