FRANCE'S MUNITION KINGS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 273, 17 November 1936, Page 6

FRANCE'S MUNITION KINGS.

The decision of the French Government to take legal proceedings against Messrs. Schneider on the -.barge of supplying defective torpedoes marks another stage in the French campaign for the nationalisation of armament firms', writes the London diarist of the "Evening Standard." The firm, established during the Second Empire, has its works at Creusot, in the centre of France. It has always prospered, and has made fortunes for three generations of Schneiders, several of whom have now married into such aristocratic French families as the Saint-Sauveurs, the Juignes and the Brissacs. M. Eugene Schneider, the present head of the firm, takes 110 direct part in politics, although he is said to be a generous contributor to party funds. There was one Schneider who was President of the French Legislature in Xapolcon lll.'s time. He was the hero of an amusing story. He had as a. contemporary, but not as a relative, another Schneider —Horteuse, the famous singer and beauty, who had many worshippers, including the Khedive Ismael. Once the Khedive was hurrying from Marseilles to see her when he was laid low by an attack of liver, and had to go to Vichy. He ordered his secretary to telegraph to Horteuse: "Come at once. Everything arranged." By an error, the secretary sent it to M. Schneider, who at the time was negotiating a contract'with the Egyptian Army. He went to Vichy at once, and was shown into a magnificent suite bedecked with the costliest flowers. When the Khedive came in there was astonishment and disappointment on both sides.