And I carry away with me as a last remembrance of this great town and its
activities two recollections--one of a university man doing some highly
skilled work on a particularly fine gauge: "If you ask me what I have
been doing for the last few weeks, I can only tell you that I have been
working like a nigger and have done nothing! Patience!--that's all there
is to say." And another of a "transformed" shop of moderate size, where an
active and able man, after giving up the whole of his ordinary business,
has thrown himself into the provision, within his powers, of the most
pressing war needs, as he came across them.

In July last year, for instance, munitions work in many quarters was
actually held up for want of gauges. Mr. D. made something like 10,000, to
the great assistance of certain new Government shops. Then the Government
asked for a particular kind of gun. Mr. D. undertook 1,000, and has
already delivered 400. Tools for shell-making are _everywhere_ wanted in
the rush of the huge demand. Mr. D. has been making them diligently. This
is just one example among hundreds of how a great industry is adapting
itself to the fiery needs of war.

But the dark has come, and I must catch my train. As I speed through a
vast industrial district I find in the evening papers hideous details of
the Zeppelin raid, which give a peculiar passion and poignancy to my
recollections of a crowded day--and peculiar interest, also, to the talk
of an able representative of the Ministry of Munitions, who is travelling
with me, and endeavouring to give me a connected view of the whole new
organisation. As he speaks, my thoughts travel to the English battle-line,
to the trenches and casualty clearing-stations behind it, to distant
Russia; and I think of the Prime Minister's statement in Parliament--that
the supply of munitions, for all its marvellous increase, is not yet equal
to the demand. New shops, new workers, new efforts--England is producing