ENGLAND AT WAR

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 256, 17 July 1918, Page 2

ENGLAND AT WAR

AMERICAN WOMAN'S IMPRESSION

Miss Joy M. Higgins, a member of tho American Labour delegation to England, lias given to tho "Fall Mall Gazette some, of her impressions of the gieat, work tho women of England aro doing in helping to win the war. "I have 110 words to express tno admiration I feel 'for my English sisters. It' there is such a thing as a woman slacker in this country, I certainly have not met her. To see the women at Wk —performing men's tasks at bench and lathe wielding heavy hammers in shipbuilding yards, driving trains, cleaning engines, felling trees, nursing wounded (what is there they have not tried?) —is. the experience of a lifetime. They never seem to tire. Your young girls are the gayest, most light-hearted workers I have ever como across. There may be mourning in their hearts, but nothing ever clouds their faces. And in tiheir eyes shines the spirit of that noble purpose which lifts even the humblest work they perform into the realm of the sublime. , , , "This is quite as true of the'voluntary workers as of the wage-earning sort. I havo seen titled ladies at work side by side with girls of the order to which their one-time maids belonged; yet there was no trace of snobbishness or condescension in their manner. Your uniforms are your greatest .breakers-down of class distinction. Every old-fashioned prejudice is forgotten in the- one idea of uuited and unselfish labour. i "Labour is a glorious word. I .fancy this war will show us at last what it really mcaiis. When peer and commoner share the same tasks, give their strength and their talents unstintingly in the sanio cause, and through this very contact gain an understanding of find a respect for each other such as they have never known before, the dignity . of ! Labour is placed beyond all question. The extent to which England lias already arrived at,this state commands my admiration. It proves that the big democracy of the hour hns! firmly taken root here. I am thrilled and borne up by the message I shall have to bring to the American women. If. will bo n message full of noble truth. 'In England,' I shall tell them, 'the women are toiling with a smile upon their lips. They go about their work as if every day were a holiday.' "