Every 15 pounds of finished smokeless powder requires 14 pounds of cotton and 700 pounds of mixed acid for its nitration, so we made the gun-cotton to the extent of more than 500,000,000 pounds on this side of the water, thus saving the excess tonnage that would have been required for the shipment of the raw materials. A similar condition obtained with regard to high explosives. Guided by the same sound principle, we shipped in bulk enough pierced shell blanks to keep the French and British factories going to the limit of their capacity, and so on through the endless list of articles or components required for our common use. For, be it remembered, it was not our war alone. [Illustration: AN AMERICAN 75-MM. IN ACTION. The French admitted that the 75-mm. field gun as built in the United States in several respects excelled their own famous Soixante-Quinze. _Photograph by Signal Corps, U. S. A._] [Illustration: THE 37-MM. GUN IN ACTION. This vicious, hard-hitting, and extremely mobile little weapon proved of enormous value in wiping out machine-gun nests.] The quality of our product is attested by the almost pathetic eagerness of the _poilu_ to acquire an American rifle with its beautifully adjusted sights, its admirable breech mechanism, and its rimless, non-jamming ammunition; by the universally acknowledged excellence of the American automatic pistol; by the purchase by the French Government of 550 155-mm. howitzers built in America from French designs; by the cabled request of the French Government for a continuous supply of 3,000 Browning machine-guns _every month_ and 50,000,000 cartridges for them, after witnessing their performance under battle conditions; by the general order from British General Headquarters directing that on account of its greater uniformity, and consequent less danger to the troops advancing under its protection, _only American-made powder_ be used for artillery barrages—all these are tributes to American science, American engineering, and American industry, as exemplified in American ordnance, by qualified judges who were backing their opinions with their lives. * * * * *