to
recruitingstations, but selectiveservice, operating smoothly except in
the extreme West, took care of mobilization and the war was accepted, if
not with enthusiasm, at least as an inescapable fate.

The coming of the grass had not depleted nor unbalanced the country's
resources beyond readjustment, but it had upset the sensitive workings
of the national economy. This was tolerable by a sick land--and the
grass had made the nation sick--in peacetime; but "war is the health of
the state" and the President moved quickly.

All large industries were immediately seized, as were the mines and
means of transportation. A basic fiftyfivehour workweek was imposed. A
new chief of staff and of naval operations was appointed and the young
men went off to camp to train either for implementing or repelling
invasion. Then came a period of quiet during which both countries
attacked each other ferociously over the radio.

_40._ In the socialistic orgy of nationalizing business, I was
fortunate; Consolidated Pemmican and Allied Concentrates was left in the
hands of private initiative. Better than that, it had not been tied
down and made helpless by the multiplicity of regulations hampering the
few types of endeavor remaining nominally free of regimenting
bureaucracy. Opportunity, long prepared for and not, I trust,
undeserved, was before me.

In the pass to which our country had come it seemed to me I could be of
most service supplying our armed forces with fieldrations. Such an
unselfish and patriotic desire one would think easy of realization--as I
so innocently did--and I immediately began interviewing numberless
officers of the Quartermaster's Department to further this worthy aim.

I certainly believe every corporation must have its rules, otherwise
executives would be besieged all day by timewasters. The United States
government is surely a corporation, as I always used to say in
advocating election of a business administration, and standard
procedures and regulations are essential. Still, there ought to be a
limit to the number and length of questionnaires to fill out and the
number of underlings to interview before a serious businessman can get
to see a responsible official.

After making three fruitless trips to Washington and getting
exhaustively familiar with countless tantalizing waitingrooms, I became
impatient. The man I needed to see was a Brigadier General Thario, but
after wasting valuable days and hours I was