No matter how we heed the example of the few progressive Americans who have successfully planted their business interests in France, we will face a new handicap when the war ends. As in England, we will be bang up against an industrial awakening that will mark an epoch. Coupled with this revival will be an efficiency born of the war needs that will act as a tremendous speeder-up.

In France this galvanised industrial life will be stimulated by a brilliant imagination wholly lacking in the English temperament. It will go a long way toward opening up fresh fields of labour and distribution.

Self-sufficiency will be the keynote. The automobile is a striking instance. We had established a very promising motor market (and especially with moderate-and low-priced cars) among the French. When the Government assumed control of the French automobile factories and changed their output to war munitions, the two great automobile syndicates protested that the cutting off of the French motor supply would mean an immense loss of good will. First came a 70 per cent duty on practically all American cars and this was followed up by an almost complete restriction of all American cars.

This prohibition will have the same effect as the English exclusion in that it will stimulate the demand for the native French cars. Here we get to one of the striking phases of the new industrial development of immense concern to us. France has her eye on quantity output. Many signs point to it.

When the war broke out, a certain young French engineer saw great opportunity in shell making. He was immuned from military service, he had a little capital of his own, and with Government aid he set to work. Within four months he had built an enormous plant on the banks of the Seine almost within the shadow of the Eiffel Tower. In six months he had enlarged his capacity so that he was producing 15,000 shells a day. Last summer he sent for the agent of a large American machinery company: "I am going to make automobiles in series after the war." "In series" is the French way of expressing quantity output.

"All right," said the American. "What can I do for you?"

"Simply this," said the Frenchman. "I wish to order sufficient automatics to meet the demand when peace comes."

This is the spirit of the awakened French industry. I know of half a dozen automobile and other producing establishments who are making plans to manufacture popular-priced cars when the war is over. This output will not only affect the sale of American cars in France, but will also interfere with the market for our cheap machines in South America. Already France is making every effort to increase her Latin-American trade. She has immense sums of money invested in Brazil and she will follow up this advantage keenly.

It is important for us to remember that France like England will have a well oiled productive machine after the war. It will not only be better but bigger than ever before. The German ill wind that devastated the northern section will blow good in the end. Hundreds of factories operated by hand labour before the war will now be equipped with American labour-saving machinery. The products of these machines operated by cheap labour will be in competition with our own commodities manufactured by more expensive labour in many of the markets of the world.

Formerly the French artisan could produce an article almost from raw material to finished product: now he has learned to stand at an automatic and labour at a single part. In short, he is becoming a specialist which makes him a cog in the machine of quantity output.

What is true of machines and men is also true of money. The old wariness of the French banker in underwriting industry is passing away. He is thinking in terms of large figures and vast projects.

I could cite many examples of the new Gospel of French Self-Supply. Before the war France manufactured lathes that were beautiful examples of art and precision. The firms that made them were old and solid and took infinite pride in their product. Now they realise that output must dominate. A simple type of machine has been chosen as model and will henceforth be made in large quantities.

Then there is the sewing machine. Before the war two groups—Anglo-American and German—controlled the French market. By the ingenious use of export premiums, the Germans had the best of it.

"Why always pay tribute to strangers?" now asks the French housewife. So far as Germany is concerned, this question is already settled. But the American sewing machine will have to struggle for its existence hereafter in France, for plans have been made for at least three huge factories for its production.

Striking evidence of the growing French industrial independence of Germany is her advance in crucible making. For years SÈvres vied with Limoges for ceramic honours. To-day the vast plant which once produced the most exquisite and delicate ware in the world is now producing the less lovely but more serviceable crucibles, condensers and retorts necessary for the distillation of the powerful acid used in modern high explosives. Previous to the war, the Central Empire had a monopoly on this market. Indeed, much of the pottery and glassware used in laboratories and chemical factories was made in Bohemia and marketed by Germany. Now the SÈvres plant is shipping these goods to England and Russia.

So, too, with dye stuffs. A whole new French colouring industry is being created. A SociÉtÉ d'Etude has been formed to make a scientific survey and this will be replaced by a National Company to undertake the manufacture of all coal tar products.

The use of a certain number of new war factories has been guaranteed to the company by the Minister of War. Typical of the purpose which will animate the enterprise is one of the articles of the National Company which provides that the Director of the Dye Stuff Industry must be of French birth. An agreement has also been made with England and Italy to protect the colour output of the three countries with a high tariff after the war. Here you find one tangible evidence of the working out of the Paris Economic Pact.

Even while the invader's hand still lies heavy upon the land, France looks ahead to reconstruction. Last summer Paris flocked to a graphic exhibition of how to rebuild a destroyed city. It was called La CitÉ RÉconstituÉ, and was held in the Tuileries Garden. Here you could see the modern way of making a Phoenix rise quickly out of the ashes. There were model schoolhouses, churches, factories, and cottages, all with standardised parts which could be thrown together in an almost incredibly short time.

With Self-Sufficiency has come a desire for new business knowledge. Not long ago an American business man who has lived in Paris for many years, received a letter from a young French friend in the trenches at Verdun. The soldier wrote:

"I realise that when this war is over we must be better equipped than ever before to meet world business competition. I want to be a better salesman. Please send me some books on American salesmanship and also some of the American trade papers. I have begun the study of Spanish because I believe we are going to have our part in the Latin-American trade." Here was a young Frenchman risking his life every moment in one of the greatest battles the world has ever known: yet in the midst of death he was looking forward to a new business life.

The whole attitude of the Frenchman toward life has undergone a change, first under the stress of ruthless war, and under the spur of his kindling desire for rehabilitation. Formerly, for example, the French loathed to travel. When he knew he was going away on a journey, he spent a month telling his relatives good-bye. Now he packs his bag and is off in an hour to Lyon, Marseilles, Bordeaux, or any other place where business might dictate.

The new and efficient French industrial machine is not the only factor that American business in France must reckon with after the war. The French woman is fast becoming a force, thus setting up an altogether unequal and almost unfair competition, because to shrewd wit and resource is added the power of sex and beauty.

In France, as most people know, the woman exerts an enormous influence, regardless of her social class. In all regulated bourgeois families the wife holds the purse strings; in the small shops she keeps the cash and runs things generally. No average Frenchman would think of embarking on any sort of enterprise without first talking it over with his femme, who is also his partner. This team work lies at the root of all French thrift.

The woman of the lower class has met the grim emergency of war with sacrifice and courage. Not only has she faced the loss of those most dear with uncomplaining lips, but she has taken her man's place everywhere. You can see her standing Amazon-like in leather apron pouring molten metal in the shell factory; she drives you in a cab or a taxi; she runs the train and takes the tickets in the Underground: in short, she has become a whole new asset in the human wealth of the nation and as such she will help to make up for the inevitable shortage of men.

Her sister of the upper class, at once the most practical and most feminine of her sex, is also doing her bit. She is the lovely thorn in the path of the American business promoter in France.

Before the war, it was rare to find this type of woman competing with men in outside business affairs, although her influence has always counted immensely in official life where she pulls the strings to get husband or lover Government preferment or concession.

Since the war, however, necessity has sharply developed her latent business qualities. Now it is not unusual to find her in direct competition, using all those delightful charms with which Nature has endowed her. This is especially true of widows and women whose husbands are at the front. They often rely more upon persuasion than upon any technical or practical knowledge. One reason why they succeed is their almost uncanny knowledge of men. And this often enables them to grasp swiftly the clue that business opportunity offers.

One night at dinner a Colonel's widow, a gracious and beguiling lady, heard that the French Government was in the market for 50,000 head of cattle. The next morning she sent half a dozen cables to South America, got options, and in three days her formal bid was at the War Office. Within a week she had the contract.

I know of a case of the wife of a Colonel at the front, who heard one day at lunch that the War Office needed 50,000 sacks of flour for the army at Saloniki. That same day she put the matter before some American brokers in Paris, who wired to their New York firm and received the usual American reply: "Am not interested in the French trade now. Will wait until after the war."

With the utmost difficulty the woman was able to secure 10,000 sacks by way of Italy and Switzerland. She is not likely to seek American sources of supply soon again.

An American got a tip one day that a certain contract for machine tools was available. He had an appointment for lunch, so he said to himself: "Why hurry? These French people are slow. I'll get busy this afternoon or to-morrow."

When he went to the establishment in question the next day, he found that an exquisitely gowned woman had just preceded him; indeed, the fragrance of the perfume she used still hovered about the outer office. The man cooled his heels for half an hour when the lovely feminine vision flashed by him going out. He started to make his selling talk to the Purchasing Agent, who said, at the first opening:

"I am extremely sorry, Monsieur, but we have just closed the contract with Madam Blank who left a few moments ago."

The New France has brought forth a New Woman!

Through all the organised approach to Self-Sufficiency and Economic Rehabilitation, France has not lost sight of her grudge against the Germans. Indeed, no phase of her business life to-day is more picturesque than the campaign now in full swing not only against Teutonic trade, but against any resumption of commercial relation with the hated enemy across the Rhine. Right here you get a striking difference between English and French methods. While Britain takes out some of her enmity against German trade in eloquent conversation, France has gone about it in a practical way, shot through with all the colour and imagination that only the French could employ upon such procedure.

Preliminary to this campaign was a characteristic episode. Almost with the flareup of war, the French mind turned sentimentally to those fateful early Seventies when Germany in the flush of her great victory seized the fruits of that triumph. Some of those fruits were embodied in the famous Treaty of Frankfort in which the Teuton clamped the mailed fist down on every favoured French trade relation.

The war automatically annulled this treaty, and although the nation was in the first throes of a struggle that threatened existence, it celebrated the revocation in characteristic fashion. Millions of copies of the Frankfort Treaty were printed and sold on the streets of Paris and elsewhere. The excited Frenchman rushed up and down brandishing his copy and saying: "Now we will ram this treaty down the throat of the Boche!"

This emotional prelude was now followed by a definite crusade for the elimination of German goods. Anti-German societies were formed all over the country. Backing these up are dozens of other formidable organisations, such as Chambers of Commerce and Business Clubs. Typical of the campaign is the formation of a Buyers' League which is intended to assemble all persons who will take a resolution never to buy a German product and be satisfied for the remainder of their lives with the French manufactured article.

Wherever you go in France, you find some concrete and striking evidence of the Anti-German wave. When you get a bundle from a Paris shop, you are likely to find stuck on it a brilliantly coloured stamp showing a pair of bloody hands holding a number of packages, the largest one labeled "made in Germany." Under it is the sentence in French reading: "Frenchmen, do not buy German products. The hands that made are reddened with the blood of our soldiers."

There is great variety in these stamps, which are used on letters and packages. One of the most popular shows a helmeted German with a brutal face holding a smiling mask before his visage. In one hand he holds a bundle marked "Made in Germany." On this stamp is the inscription: "Mistrust their smiles—in every German there is a spy."

Still another and equally popular stamp pictures a soldier with bandaged head standing by a prostrate comrade and pointing to a fleeing German. The inscription reads: "We chase the Germans during the war. You, civilians, will you allow them to return after peace?"

One stamp used much throughout the Provincial French cities shows a woman in deep mourning weeping over a grave marked with a cross surmounted by a red soldier cap. The woman is supposed to be saying these words: "French people, buy no more German products. Remember this grave."

A companion stamp shows a figure representing the French Republic and holding the tri-colour. The flag is attached to a spear with which she is piercing the breast of a German eagle on the ground. At her side is the national bird of France, the Cock, crowing triumphantly. Underneath are the words: "Refuse all German products."

Similar in idea is another dramatic conception showing a white robed female figure holding a battle axe in one hand and pointing with the other to a burning cathedral. Her words are: "Frenchmen, do not consume any German products. Remember 1914."

Most of the large French cities have their own Anti-German stamps which are enlarged and used on billboards as posters. A typical city stamp is that of Lyon, which shows a Cock in brilliant colours standing proudly in the red and blue rays of a white sun. Attached is the legend: "National League of Defence of French Interests—The Anti-German League: Buy French Products."

The City of Marseilles has a stamp showing the French Cock standing on a German helmet surrounded by the words "Anti-German League." Elsewhere on the stamp is the inscription: "No more of the people—No more German products."

Whether the Frenchman buys or sells, he has poked under his nose or flaunted before his eyes every hour of the business day some concrete evidence that his country has put the German people and their products under the ban.

In connection with this campaign are some facts of utmost significance to the American business man who has studied the intent and purpose of the Paris Economic Pact which is described in a previous chapter, and which declared for an Allied war of economic reprisal against Germany and the other Central Powers. In that chapter, as you may recall, the point was made that since individuals and not nations do business, the Pact was likely to fail.

With their usual intelligence, the French understand this, and their whole educational campaign at home is to make the individual Frenchman immune against the lure of the cheap German products. The French know that it is the sum of individual French resistance to German buying that will keep the German product forever outside the realm of the Republic.

Indeed, the clearest-minded men in France to-day believe that more commercial advantage will accrue to France by the intensive development of her resources, the perfection of old industries and the creation of new ones than in the formation of committees devoted to plans for commercial alliances dedicated to reprisal. In other words, this helps to bear out the theory held in many quarters that the economic pact is after all merely a campaign document and utterly impracticable.

In France there are other signs that point to a rift in the Pact. While I was in Paris, a well known Senator pointed out that as soon as the war ended France would need coal and would look to Italy for it as she had done in the past. To obtain her coal more cheaply than she is now doing from the United States or England, Italy would very likely make concessions to Germany in order to obtain German fuel. The result would be an interchange of merchandise between the two countries regardless of the decree of the Paris Pact. The question arises: Could France place restrictions upon the Italian frontier to the annoyance of her Allies?

Meanwhile France is seeking immunity from any future coal crisis by developing a system of hydraulic power which will not only be economical, but will also help to cut down her imports. It is just one more phase of the ever-widening programme of Self-Sufficiency.

Despite our past blunders, our present lack of organised initiative, and the efforts toward Self-Supply, the future holds a large business opportunity for America in France. As a matter of fact, half of the selling work is already registered because the French are eager and anxious to do business with their great sister democracy across the sea. It is, therefore, up to the American exporter to capitalise the needs of the nation and the good will that it bears toward us. But it must be done now.

For one thing, it cannot be achieved without constructive co-operative work. Groups of exporters must organise and establish offices in Paris and elsewhere in France. The reason for this is that the Frenchman abhors the fly-by-night salesman: he likes to feel that the man with whom he is trading has taken some sort of root in his midst.

With organisation must come knowledge. Why did the Germans succeed so amazingly in France? Geographical proximity and the Frankfort Treaty helped some, but the principal selling power he wielded was that he lived with his clients, found out what they wanted, and gave it to them. If a French farmer, for example, wanted a purple plough share fastened to a yellow body, the German assumed that he knew what he wanted and made it for him. The average American exporter, on the other hand, has always assumed that the foreign customer had to take what was given to him. For this reason we have failed in South America and for this reason we will fail in France unless we change our methods. Knowledge is selling power.

We must be prepared to give the French long credits, and if necessary, finance French enterprises. Despite her immense gold hoardings, she may feel an economic pinch after the war. We must also have sound and organised French credit information.

Our salesmen must know the French language and sympathise with the French temperament. Give the French buyer a ghost of a chance and he will meet you more than half way. Unlike the stolid Englishman he is plastic, adaptable and imaginative. Understanding is a large part of the trade battle.

We must accumulate large stocks of American goods in France to indulge the purchaser in his favourite occupation of long and elaborate choosing and to meet demands for renewal. To ship these goods we must have our own bottoms. Here, as elsewhere in the whole export outlook, is the old need of a merchant marine.

But we will never realise our trade destiny in France without reciprocity. We cannot sell without buying. France looks to us to take part of the huge flood of goods that once went to Germany. We take some of her wine: we must take more. We buy her silks and frocks: the American market for them must now be widened. We depended upon Germany for many of our toys: France expects the Anglo-Saxon nursery henceforth to rattle with the mechanical devices which will provide meat and drink for her maimed soldiers. And so on down a long list of commodities.

All this means that before the mood cools we must conclude new commercial treaties with France and assure for ourselves a really favoured nation relation that carries the guarantee of a permanent foreign trade now so necessary to our permanent prosperity.

In the last analysis you will find that it is France and not England to whom we must look for the larger commercial kinship after the war. The spirit of the awakened Britain, so far as we are concerned, is the spirit of militant trade conquest: the dominant desire of the speeded-up France is benevolent Self-Sufficiency.

Whether England realises her vast dream remains to be seen. But one thing is certain: No man can watch France in the supreme Test of War without catching the thrill of her heroic endeavour, or feeling the influence of that immense and unconquerable serenity with which she has faced Triumph and Disaster. They proclaim the deathlessness of her democracy, the hope of a new world leadership in art and craft.

She will be a worthy trade ally.