THE "BREAD OF TEARS"

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2392, 23 February 1915, Page 5

THE "BREAD OF TEARS"

A CRY PROM BELGIUM URGENT APPEAL FOR FOOD FROM ,NEW ZEALAND & AUSTRALIA ; Sydney, February 22. ■' The Belgian Commission has sent by oable a long appeal to Australia and New Zealand, asking for a continuous and supreme effort on behalf of seven million starving Belgians. • Tho sum of £1,250,000 sterling must be provided every month. In Brussels alone, two 'hundred thou-, sand people wait daily in the siloiv for tho "bread of tears." In Liege, thirty thousand old men, women, and children, and cripples wait for the half-pound of bread and litre of soup which enable them to : live. Babies and children oan barely be *kept alive for want of milk.

The Commission expresses the fear that the, amazing self-restraint of the people, who are suppressing their inevitable hatred, ■will collapse under the impelling influence of anguish and hunger,- and that they will, though unarmed, strike desperately, with,trade futility, against the invader. They will suffer the inevitable consequences; they will be shot like ravenous dogs. Will Australia and New Zealand stand by and calmly await such an end to a noble sacrifice? Only a stupendous and organised effort can avert the catastrophe. Four good-sized' cargoes of cereals must he shipped to Belgium weekly, or the Belgian nation, to the 'World's eternal shame, will perish. The Commission undertakes to carry cargoes of relief supplies free. Wheat nnd money are chiefly*, required. Seventv-five thousand pounds sterling will fill a five-thousnml-ton ship with cargo, and keep Belstinm from starvation for two days. . Will Australia and New Zealand give £75.000, or'its epuivalent in food, monthlv ? The effort must be not oiily superhuman, but continuous.

FEEDING BELGIUM Mr. Herbert Hoover, chairman of. the Commission for Relief in Belgium', wlio returned to London from .a tour of inspection through . Belgium receutly, issued ft repprt describing how a whole nation was being fed, arid recounting a magnificent example of chivalrous generosity on the part of distressed Belgians towards starving French peasants*. Tlio organisation for distribution of food supplies in Belgium was now well on the road to completion, lie wrote. The actiial distribution is effected through an elaboration of the. communal organisations controlled from .-various' branch offices. There are over 50,000 volunteer workers engaged in this undertaking, the larger proportion of these being occupied in looking after tlio 1.400.000 destitute people supplied by' tlio. free cantecns. Our problem, he says, falls into two phases; first, the provision of bread for those who arc able to pay for Tt. and, second, tlio provision of all food for those who are destitute. Broadlv ytlio former comprise some 5.600,000 people, and on the basis _ of lie minimum ration wears providing: (Tfe.v raqull'a utaut, £fOO ( O0O w!il) df 1 .biwA,w.BORWi tsw

money i 6 an' exchange problem not as yet solved, and one that is causing us great concern. The destitute comprise about 1,400,000 souk now wholly fed by the public canteens, and the cost of supporting them amounts to about £500.000 per monthy which finance reste on the charity Of the world.

' PRACTICAL SYMPATHY IN WELLINGTON. The above message has already quickened the sympathies of. the 'Wellington public. As tho result of v a special appeal which was made at the 3 Grand Opera House last evening by the management of "The Glad Eye" Company, the sum of £20 os. 4£d. was thrown on the stage by members of the audience. The members of the company contributed £35, and Mr. Beaumont Smith, the director of the company, added £25 —roughly, £80, Thtf company intends to make a further appeal." The "Magpies" (or the BrennanFuller circuit), aro to parade the-streets of the city between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. to-morrow. In connection with" this effort it is announced that at 12.30 p.m. the company will call a halt at the junction of Dixon and Cuba Streets (next the Royal Oak Hotel), where Mr. Lou Vernon will auction a, "Magpie" doll in aid of the distressed Belgians, and in tho Post Office Square at 1.30 p.m. the same performer will sell b,v auction a Belgian dill.' Permission to hold the auction has been granted by the Minister of Internal Affairs, and the Town Clerk has given permission to hold tho street parade.