ion
Metallic Cartridge Company.

Government officials, when notified of this new propaganda yesterday,
were a unit in declaring it was impossible to believe that such a
scheme could be carried through successfully. In the first place, they
pointed out that activity of this kind would be a direct violation of
the Sherman act, and, secondly, a case of conspiracy would lie against
individuals attempting such a movement for wholesale violation of
contracts, which would become necessary in order to carry the plan to
its successful conclusion.

The moment the German agents in New York began to disclose their
purpose, several cunning individuals who have had some slight
connection with the contracts for supplying the Allies with various
materials have deliberately put themselves in the path of these agents
under the pretext that they already had contracts, or were about to be
given contracts, and have already mulcted the German Government of
many thousands of dollars.

In two specific cases men have talked of having contracts for picric
acid--the manufacture of which necessitates the most skilled training,
with most expensive and complicated machinery, and which is only being
attempted in four places in this country, and were promptly paid off,
on their pledge that they would violate these alleged agreements. One
of these deals was made in the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel last Saturday.

Another case, which is fully authenticated, is that of a Western
dealer in horses, who delivered 1,500 horses to the port of New
Orleans for the British Government last January. As soon as he
ascertained what the German agents were doing, he produced his receipt
for delivery of his first and only order, and declared he was now
searching for 5,000 horses, in addition, for the British Government.
On his pledge to abandon this search, he was given $2,500 by German
agents.

The keen anxiety of the German Government, acting through the embassy
in Washington, to deprive the Allies of any shipments of war materials
that they can possibly stop is based on the result of calculations
made in Berlin and forwarded to this country two weeks ago, which
profess to show that the Allies cannot possibly arm their increasing
forces or secure ammunition for their great numbers of large guns from
their own resources, and that they must have the help of this country
in order to accomplish their purpose. The German representatives also
thoroughly believe that withou