HUNGER IN GERMANY

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2656, 30 December 1915, Page 7

HUNGER IN GERMANY

— » "THE SHADOWS AT HOME" PROTESTS ALL OVER THE EMPIRE. It is useful at this time, when many are disturbed not only by comparisons of fighting forces, but also of economic resources, to examino (says tlio "Nation") the condition of the enemy at home. Such an examination may help to explain the recklessness with which he Is sacrificing lives in hope of attaining a speedy result. During the past month the German. Press has been partially unmuzzled 011 this subject. Fierce controversy betwen papers representadifferent classes- have attempted to fix, blame for the facts upon one class or another. Appeals are made "to tho Government to take one course or other for tho future modification of the facts. • But tho facts themselves remain agreed by all. The price of the necessities of life lias risen from 75 to 100 per cent, on those prevalent at the beginning of tho war. (The women simply cannot live and rear children on the wages or Government allowances provided for soldiers' families. Potato bread is still available, but there has beon a substantial rise in the price of potatoes, and tho poor are crying to the Government .for help. Milk and butter shoiv an actual scarcity of supply, combined with prohibitive selling price. Meat is practically out of reach of the poor. All the fat substances show also conspicuous* scarcity, and a bewildered Government is calling on the German scientists to produce fat from sewage, dead horses, and other by-products of war. Berlin and the great citics look cheerful on the surface to the wan. dewng "neutral." Below, in the poor quarters, women are standing en queue often all night for tho right to purchaso fragments of meat, bacon, or lard in the morning, and-tnore are scuffles and struggles, during which, in something like a riot, tho weakest go to tho wall. The "Vorwaerts" of October 15 last describes the socnes at the sales in the municipal shops of meat and lard. The sales began at 7 o'clock in the morning and lasted till 10 o'clock. At 10.30,; in ouo shop there were still 100 people when it was closed', aud some 1000 had. to go away empty-handed. Women complained that they had spent three or four nights near the shop door, and yet had not arrived early enough to be served with meat. Under tho heading "The Miseries of War," the sceno is described-of crowds'of old men, women, and children at the barracks'with pots and pails for an hour and half for the gift of the remains of the soldiers' meal. .. "Tho rise in the price 'of foodstuffs drives to the barrack door many who in other times would never have dreamt of begging for a , Government Unpopular. In regions as far apart as Silesia'and Aachen demonstrations of protest are recorded, sometimes active and violent, sometimes the mere mute appeal <jf processions of women, half-starved, exhibiting their half-starved children. Everywhere everybody thinks that the. Government should interfere, while nowhere does anyone clearly understand ' what the • Government could do. In Berlin (according to the "Tageblatt") the authorities have issued a preliminary order, limiting, the maximum selling price of butter in Berlin and Brandenburg to 2s. Bd. a pound, to remain in force until October 31. Meantime, however, the-smaller towns, in such districts as Central Silesia, protest that the goods brought to their markets were bought by the dealers und sold in the big towns; and the effect of their fixing maximum prices only accelerated that disappearance.' They are informed, indeed, that despite the innumerable efforts made in . different places and by different authorities, prices were likely to continue to rise; and the statement is endorsed all over the country by . a united Press. Political economy (that dread "academic" science suddenly revivified by wax) also troubles the Burgomaster of Vienna, who plaintively pleads to a half-starved populace, "If I, fix maximum prices high enough' to induce tho Hungarian pig dealers to sell, consumers in. Vienna abuse me; if I fix them low enough'to please , the consumers, ' the Hungarians refuse to sell." Tho Misery of Wjfr. Wherever we plunge beneath the flagwaving, iniis;c. iiannV,GJefci'at!*s<; triumph of arms, this note of misery is apparent—the misery of war. "The shadows at home," Paul Harms calls it in the "Berliner Tageblatt," contrasted with, and, to some extent, clouding the great military achievements of Germany abroad. Ho bitterly attacks the Government fy.fumblingly and inefficiently dealing with the problem, and complains that an empire waging war. against three world-powers is seemingly unable to deal with the feeding of its own people, and that the sole result of this incapacity will be an immense revival of Socialism after the war. "The pity of it," he asserts, "is that our brave men and our mighty empire always seem in the field to ba condemned to begin all over again." The "Frankfurter," always a docile supporter of the middle-class sentiment,! has also been suddenly anxious, and announces grave dissatisfaction widely felt at the present state of the food supply. Tho authorities must, if necessary, not shrink from the extension of the bread ■ ticket to return from the Western front in order to deal with these vital matters. How vital these matters are, how great the misery, is revealed in "Vorwaerts," in. a Cologne incident. A bed and wardrobe were offered as a gift'in a local paper.' .The applications were overwhelming, and sample' Incidents are quoted. "As I am a. poor soldier's wife, with three smalt children and only, one I)e3 and no [Wardrobes, I beg to reply to your advertisement-." "I'am a soldier's wife, witli .two children, and have no bed—sleep upon the ground. ?ily dwelling is open to inspection at any /time." So the pitiful records read. ' 'Have no wardrobe, and, as lam far gone in consumption, I need a bed to sleffr alone. We have five children and four are dead;" Another has a husband come back from the fighting line, now in a sanatorium, incurable. She cannot buy herself a bed, as she has not the monov. Tho war allowance is insufficient even to provide food for the children. A Dream That Has Passed. The short, successful war the spoils of victory, the wealth of Belgium, huge indemnities, annexation of- colonies, trade which would make everyone prosperous and contented, and bring back the armies in triumph and splendour— that was the reward promised and the dream dreamed. To-day the reality is growing daily farther from that intoxicating vision; in tlie sight of enormous' and increasing (esses in tho field, starving women at homo fighting, for food for their children,, the miseries of another winter in sight, with increasing privatiou, and no alternative but niin, whether victorious or defeated, at tho end.