Part 9 (1/2)

In the afternoon we had a meeting with the citizens and the Chamber of Commerce of Gren.o.ble. The discussion took a very wide range--from the tariff question to the latest news from the front.

Next the party visited a plant for the manufacture of sheet steel by electricity.

In the evening we were banqueted at the Grand Hotel. On my right sat M.

Paisant, Director General; on my left was Mr. Thomas W. Mutton, Vice-consul of the United States of America at Gren.o.ble; near was was Mr. Tenot, Prefect of the district.

This part of France is noted for the amount of cement manufactured.

Walnuts are grown in this section in large quant.i.ties. I discussed these things with Mr. Murton.

There was a discussion at the banquet over female suffrage and the birthrate, and this grew very animated.

On Friday, September 29th, we left Gren.o.ble and stopped at Voiron and were here treated, at 9:30 A. M., with a ”pet.i.t dejeuner”. We next visited the monastery Grande. This was founded in the Twelfth century by St. Bruno. The present building was commenced and completed in the sixteenth century and the community originally had forty-two monks or fathers. This monastery is where the celebrated liquor, ”Chartreuse”, was manufactured, the basis of which is brandy, distilled flowers, and herbs. This formula was known only to the monks. While at the monastery in France each monk had an individual garden and an individual cell.

When an extra penance seemed necessary special silence was given them and they were compelled to remain in their cells for months at a time.

There were long corridors and in the bas.e.m.e.nt places for servants and retainers. In the center of the grounds was a very beautiful place where the fathers were buried. We were told that the order was recruited mainly from the intellectual cla.s.s, many of them widowers. Special rooms were reserved for travelers without money and without price.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Monastery of Chartreuse.]

The Carthusian order of Monks established themselves at Gren.o.ble, France, in 1132. The original receipe for the famous cordial was given them in 1602 by Marshall d'Estress. Friar Jerome Maubec arranged the present formula in 1755, and it remained unchanged until their expulsion by the French Government, July 2nd, 1901. More than two hundred ingredients go to make up Chartreuse, and nowhere else in the world can this cordial be manufactured. Chartreuse is the unsolved enigma of French compounders of liqueurs. Its manufacture has ceased. It is quite true that at Tarragona, Spain, the monks still continue to make cordial under the name of ”Peres Chartreux”, but it is generally agreed that, owing to the change of locality and climate, the ”Peres Chartreux” now made there is not equal to the old Chartreuse. There are a number of people in Gren.o.ble who make imitation Chartreuse, but it is not so good as the real thing.

The monastery library contained twenty-two thousand volumes. These monks were also known as the Chartreusers, or Carthusian Monks. This was the head monastery, but there were branches in Italy, Spain, and Portugal.

The fathers lived on a simple diet and no meat was allowed. They were not allowed to speak to each other except twice a week, on Sunday and Thursday. This old monastery is now used as a hospital for convalescents.

After this most interesting visit we were taken to luncheon at the Hotel du Grand Som, and later for a ride of one hundred miles in the military automobiles, through a mountainous country.

We arrived at Annecy at 8 P. M. and stopped at the Imperial Palace Hotel. This is one of the finest watering places in France. A beautiful lake surrounds the hotel, with mountains in the distance.

The next morning we called upon the Mayor and went through the usual speeches. We were given a boat ride on the lake. Then we visited an old castle. The coast looked very much like the coast of Maine between Bath and Squirrel Island. We were taken by boat from Annecy to Menthon and had luncheon at the Palace Hotel. Here Mr. Damour made his first speech, which was received so enthusiastically that he was kissed by nearly all the Frenchmen present.

We then visited an electric steel plant at Acierils, the French name being the ”Electriques of Ugine”. We were greeted by, among other things, a couple of American flags, but they were upside down.

We left Annecy at 5 P. M. for Lyons and stopped at the Terminus Hotel.

We saw a number of tattooed soldiers, that is tattooed with powder marks, they having seen service.

On Sunday, October 1st, at 8 A. M. we left Lyons for Le Creusot, where the great French steel plant is located. A serious discussion was held on the train about going to the front and the dangers were depicted quite vividly. We stopped at Chagny, after pa.s.sing a very old church dating back to the Tenth century. We saw, as we pa.s.sed along, droves of beautiful white cows, with not a speck of color.

X.

THE CREUSOT GUN WORKS

Arriving in Le Creusot we stopped at the Grand Hotel Moderne and had a most enjoyable Sunday evening. It was discovered that our French secretary, Emile Garden, had quite a tenor voice. He started in to sing the Ma.r.s.eilles Hymn, and it was not long until all the Commission joined, and then the hotel employes. Before we got through scores of people came in from the street to see what was going on. The incident was telegraphed by the newspaper correspondents to the Paris papers, and it aided in the work of the commissioners by showing their patriotism and sympathy for France.

We were told that there had been no strike at Le Creusot for twenty-five years. The employes wear a special sleeve decoration which indicates that they are in the same cla.s.s as soldiers; that is to say, they are making cannon and munitions and working for France.

We were given a breakfast at the Schneider club house and then visited the plant. We were refused admission to the munitions plant. The works employ about twenty thousand men and two thousand women. The output of the plant is large projectiles, and for this reason the number of women employed is relatively small. A number of five hundred and twenty millimeter sh.e.l.ls were shown to us; these sh.e.l.ls are more than seven feet long and weigh a ton and a half. We were also shown the guns from which they are fired, but these were not quite completed. This plant contains four blast furnaces of very small capacity, making special grades of pig iron. The initial heat is not used, the steel being reheated and repoured. A good deal of Vanadium alloy is used, and this is made in America. At this plant we met Mr. Edmond Lemaitre, an engineer who had been in Youngstown employed as an inspector. All the employes, both men and women, wear wooden shoes. We noticed an absence of safety devices and safety notices. Armored cars were being manufactured for the government as well as armor plate, but this armor plate mill was away behind the mills in our own country.

We had luncheon at the club house, but no speeches were made. None of the proprietors or directors of the company was present. We then visited the company hospital, a part of which was occupied by electric devices for treating the wounded. Then we came to the home where the orphans of the employes are taken care of.