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DAMMING OUR BLACK RIVER OF WASTE 347
AN UP-TO-DATE COAL-CUTTING MACHINE
In regard to actual mine equipment we arc well advanced. Pick and shovel methods largely have been superseded by
these mechanical cutters.
whose occupation in times of peace had
been coal digging.
Results did not justify expectations.
It was found that patriotism needs the
stimulus of uniforms, music, and military
glamour. Men do not pull on overalls
with the ready enthusiasm that they display
in donning khaki uniforms. Those
who came back from the battle line did
not wield picks with the ardor they
served machine guns. So England, even
at the present time, is not turning out
her normal output of coal.
To add to the difficulty, England is
also obliged to furnish her allies, Italy
and France, with coal. When the Germans
overran northern France, they occupied
the rich coal and iron fields of
that country. Thus at one stroke France
found these vital resources gone. England,
in spite of her own diminished supply,
took steps to make up the deficiency.
She has had great difficulty in doing this,
and the French have been hard put to it
at times to keep their factories in operation.
So stringent, indeed, has this shortage
become that few electric lights are now
being lit at night in the French capital.
Tin's means, too, a limiting of street car
traffic. There is not the coal to spare
for the generating of electricity for
civilian purposes. Moreover, theaters
are only permitted to give performances
on certain specified nights of the week,
and this regulation holds true also of
motion picture theaters, which are required
to close at ten o'clock.
It is a curious sight to the outsider,
who in times past has walked down the
brilliantly lighted boulevards of Paris, to
survey spring fashions through the shop
windows illuminated only by feeble candlelight.
Similar conditions prevail, of course,
in the other cities and towns of France.
All of Italy is in a like predicament.
The feverish prosecution of the submarine
warfare has practically cut off.
for the time being at least, shipments of
coal from the United States to Europe.
Both China and Japan produce a
mediocre quality. Australia is comparatively
rich in fields that compare
favorably with our best Pocahontas
product. Indeed, this quality is so good
that for some years our own Pacific
Coast has been supplied largely from the
Australian mines.
However, the sea lanes are still too
dangerous to transport coal from the Far
East to England and France. Few of