r cables. There is not a cable
in the place that is not immediately accessible to the electricians. We
visit the dynamos and a vast organisation of switchboards....

These things are more familiar to M. Citroen than they are to me. He
wants me to understand, but he does not realise that I would like a
little leisure to wonder. What is interesting him just now, because it
is the newest thing, is his method of paying his workers. He lifts
a hand gravely: "I said, what we must do is abolish altogether the
counting of change."

At a certain hour, he explained, came pay-time. The people had done; it
was to his interest and their that they should get out of the works
as quickly as possible and rest and amuse themselves. He watched them
standing in queues at the wickets while inside someone counted; so many
francs, so many centimes. It bored him to see this useless, tiresome
waiting. It is abolished. Now at the end of each week the worker goes
to a window under the initial of his name, and is handed a card on which
these items have been entered:

Balance from last week. So many hours at so much. Premiums.

The total is so many francs, so many centimes. This is divided into
the nearest round number, 100, 120, 80 francs as the case may be, and a
balance of the odd francs and centimes. The latter is carried forward to
the next week's account. At the bottom of the card is a tear-off coupon
with a stamp, coloured to indicate the round sum, green, let us say, for
100, blue for 130 francs. This is taken to a wicket marked 100 or 130 as
the case may be, and there stands a cashier with his money in piles of
100 or 130 francs counted ready to hand; he sweeps in the coupon, sweeps
out the cash. "_Next!_"

I became interested in the worker's side of this organisation. I insist
on seeing the entrances, the clothes-changing places, the lavatories,
and so forth of the organisation. As we go about we pass a string of
electric trolleys steered by important-looking girls, and loaded with
shell, finished as far as these works are concerned and on their way
to the railway siding. We visit the hospital, for these works demand a
medical staff. It is not only that men and women faint or fall ill, but
there are accidents, burns, crushings, and the like. The war casualties
begin already here, and they fall chiefly among the women. I saw a
wounded woman with a bandaged face sitting very quietly in the corner.

The women here face danger, perhaps