GERMAN CHRISTMAS

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20128, 23 December 1939, Page 12

GERMAN CHRISTMAS

RESTRICTED PURCHASES NEW BEAUTY CULTURE . LONDON, Dec. -6. Warnings against high expectations of Christmas trade are given in the Berlin newspaper Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitun.g. <lts correspondent, after interviewing shopkeepers in Berlin, concludes: “Tables o;f .presents will not ibe so generously spread, even though they need not he entirely empty.’’ (It is stated in the "‘Germany, Day by Day” column in The Times that a large proportion of the favourite Christmas purchases have been restricted toy the war. Shopkeepers expect a considerable fail in demand. A course of beauty treatment for the German Workers’ Front has been introduced called “present-day remedies for, cosmetics.” It is designed to draw attention to cosmetics provided by Nature instead of toy countries cut off from Germany toy the 'British blockade. 'Lipstick, rouge and powder are re-

placed by horse chestnuts, rain water and ivy leaves.

The course recommends: “The care of the 'body should be adapted to war conditions. To use milk for the care of the skin is against the law, especially as rain water is better. Horse chestnuts make a lather, and ivy leaves and potato skins can be boiled to make skin cleansers.” Shoe Exchanges

Shoe exchanges have been opened in various German towns. Mothers can bring their children’s 'footwear, which has, been outgrown, to exchange for larger sizes, 'conditional upon the footwear not being worn out. New footwear is not rationed, but can foe bought only with a permit obtained on the applicant proving that he possesses only one pair of footwear fit to wear.

Though the German people are assured that there will toe no paper clothes, as in the last war, some qf them will soon ibe wearing clothes made from potato stalks. A special factory has ibeen established in Thuringia for drying dead tops of potatoes and converting them into cellulose, which, together with cellulose made from straw, will toe used to augment Germany’s -dwindling supply of textile thread.