"BLAST FURNACES"

Maoriland Worker, Volume 12, Issue 303, 20 December 1922, Page 5

"BLAST FURNACES"

MORE EXTRACTS

October 8, 1915,

She' meets, her old friend Paronagaiih.'arid haunted by the thoughtof the Belgian, documents, shows them to Mm, asking him if he thinks the picture they, conjure up. is a true one?

He is erabarrassed land says, "YesJ you may imagine tae prologue of the Great Drama as like this.- But you have only seen the ACTORS —you liavs not seen tlie AUTHORS." When she presses h:in for his meaning, he tells her "THAT IT IS MEN . LIKE HER HUSBAND, WHO SEND MEN" LIKE HER- SON TO THE SLAUGHTER." '.*■*** December 7, 1815. . .' . Paro.n tells how- he i&rr-ivecl■ at the conviction that "THE PRESS MAKES OPINION . . . that the crowd THINKS WHAT THE PAPERS TELL, IT TO"! '[ "Last Spring," he says, "I was waiting for a train at a tiny out of the world, station. Near to mc two old country people were 'discussing the war, with si, strong countryside burr. Suddenly one of them raised his voice in a rugged perorat-ion. " 'The gravest problem of the moment.' !'• "I pricked up my ears. This phrase from the platform of the leading article wias none of his making! "A moment later the other declared in the same tone of rough oratory/ 'Rather sacrifice our last drop of blood than submit to German 'hege-' mony.' "There could be no doubt afcout It. They were simply exchanging phrases taken from 'papers.

"Once I realised this, I found that it was applicable wherever a couple of men were talk' ng- about the war.

"Tlie conversations were grave interchanges .of phrases which the speakers biad swallowed. They gave them out in their entirety—uactigestecl, chewed! "The Press, their .sole' sCuroe ot information and ideas, tells them nothing about the war, its origins tts development, and its a,ims EXCEPT WHAT IT REGARDS AS SERVING THE PURPOSES OF ITS MASTERS? It is their sole instructor and'men-tor. ... It is the Cinema which prints its moving pictures ©n, their 'Crania -, . . . and once these pictures nave been so imprinted on their docile minds, they soon imagine that they are their own production!" Paron. mentions technical books, reports and documents, which have convinced him thai the heavy 'industry exercises supreme power on both. sides of the frontier. . . . "The bitter and pitiless rivalries between these Feudalisms. The German iron masters of the Ruhr are installed over their ore depos-ts . . . The French iron masters of Briey are nistalled over their orn deposits . . . the former, HAVE ONLY COAL . . . the latter ~HAVE ONLY ORE . . . BUT THEIR BLAST FURNACES FACING ONE ANOTHER ALONG THE FRONTIER, HAVE TO BE FED WITH BOTH ORE AND COAL IN ORDER TO PRODUCE CAST IRON!

Before the war, the Germans supplied coal to th'e -French. —the French supplied ore to the" Germans . . . but the mutual dependence was a burden on both s.icles .... each felt that it was paying tribute to the other . . .

now that the war has been let loose, the Germans have dropped their masks. In January. 1915, a Dusseldcrf ironmaster made this statement to his colleagues.

"The Treaty of Frankfurt gave us the whole of Lorraine. But the geologists, consulted by Bismark t had not discovered Briey. We had ooal already. We must keep the ore of Brfey. It is of vital importance to our people thiat we. shall POSSESS THESE MILITARY AND COMMERCIAL RESOURCES. . . . In May, SIX GREAT ECONOMIC GROUPS, playing the game of the GREAT GERMAN METAL . INDUSTRY, notified the Chancellor Herr Bethrnann—-Holweg. , . . "We demand the confiscation of the mineral regions of Meurthe-et-Moselle. . . . These annexations .are not only needed for the extension of our industrial power . . . they represent MILITARY NECESSITIES." FOR NATURALLY . . . CGVETINGS ALWAYS SHELTER -UNDER THE FLAG. (To be continued.)