THE PRICE OF BREAD.

Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume 4, Issue 375, 24 February 1880, Page 2

THE PRICE OF BREAD.

To the Editor of the Alcaroa Mail

Dear Mr Editor,—Being the father of a large family (mostly hungry boya), and

with only laborer's wages to depend on, I am obliged to be very careful in making those wages go as far as possible, and with all my care, find it very hard to make both ends meet. But one of my greatest troubles in Akaroa is the price of bread, and high as the price of bread is, we seldom get but 15 ounces to the pound. I take three small loaves a day, which is generally 6 ounces short. I ask my boy how much that comes to in a year, and he says it is three loaves a day for 47 days, or 47s—I pay 8d the 41b loaf—for bread I never get. They tell me that in Christchurch you can get a 41b loaf, full weight, from 5d to 6d a loaf. I cannot see why it should be so much dearer here. There is no wonder that laboring men with only 6s and 7s a day, who have to clothe and feed a lot of hungry boys and girls with that, are obliged to go through the Court when they pay so much for short-weight bread. I remember when 1 was a boy my dad took mo to see an exhibition of waxworks. Showing the manners and customs of Turkey, one of the things that struck me most was a man with his ear nailed to a doorpost. I was told by the showman that this was a punishment for selling short-weight bread. I was so glad I did not live in Turkey for fear I might be apprenticed to a baker, and be tempted to give short weight. By printing this in your paper, you will be doing a favor to more fathers than

Yours, &c,

GBEHAN VALLEY.