* The accompanying text reads:

ACRES OF SHELLS IN A SINGLE MUNITION-FACTORY: A FRACTION OF BRITAIN'S VAST CROP OF PROJECTILES.

A GREAT BRITISH SHELL-FILLING FACTORY VISITED BY HIS MAJESTY THE KING: A HUGE STORE OF SHELLS THAT COVERS AN AREA OF NEARLY TEN ACRES.

The disaster at an expolosives-factory in the East End of London, deplorable as it was in itself, has in one sense served to indicate, by comparison, the immensity of Great Britian's constantly growing production of ammunition, for an official statement issued the day after the explosion said: "We are further informed by the Ministry of Munitions that the accident will make no practical difference to the output of munitions." Speaking a day or two later at the Mansion House on the precautions taken for the care and safety of munition-workers, Dr. Addison, the Minister of Munitions, said: "If you think of the mass of explosives being manufactured, I think you will agree that the country as been singularly free from accidents." Some idea of the "mass" of shells filled with those explosives may be obtained from the above remarkable photographs, taken at a single factory, and thus representing only a tiny fraction (relatively speaking) of the whole country's enormous production. The presence of the King in one of the photographs affords fresh proof of his Majestry's untiring interest in all that makes for the efficiency of his Navy and Army, and for a victorious conclusion to the war. Our readers will remember that, in our issue of January 20, we gave a double-page of diagrams illustrating the huge increase, both in rate and volume, of the British output of guns and munitions since the beginning of the war. Some of the amazing official figures quoted in connection with those illustrations may well be repeated here: "We are now manufacturing in 8 1/2 day the number of 75-mm. shells which we produced during the first year of the war--August 1914 to August 1915 ; the corresponding qauntity of projectiles for field-howitzers in 8 days ; that for medium guns and howitzers in about 5 days ; and that of projectiles for heavy guns and howitzers in little more than a day. Three times as many 155-mm. shells, fives times as many 200-mm. shells, and three times as many 230-mm. shells are being made per week as during the whole of the first year of the war. The new National Projectile Factories turn our nearly half of the home supply of heavy shell. These buildings, placed end to end, would run to a total length of 15 miles. They contain over 10,000 machine tools driven by 17 miles of shafting. Their weekly output along is over 10,000 tons of projectiles. There are 2 1/2 million people engaged on Government munition-work, including nearly half a million women."