LIFE IN GERMANY

Hokitika Guardian, 24 December 1920, Page 3

LIFE IN GERMANY

SIGNS OF RECOVERY

RAILWAY REORGANISED

i GENERAL FALL IN PRICES

Returning to Germany after an absence of several months, says the Berlin correspondent of an exchange, one notices at once that much has changed in the interval.' In so far as they lie on the surface tho fresh symptoms point to recovery of health and strength. It is evident that tho old habits of industry and order are reasserting themselves. There has been a general washing and brushing-np. Streets are cleaner, housefronts are being repainted, and the public services aro working witli something like the old punctuality and efficiency. In a word, Germany is settling down into her former routine, and were it not for the political factors in tho case would soon lie running smoothly •

, Tho improvement is specially noticeable on the railways. On the main lines the trains are running punctually to the second. Indeed they are doing more Coming up here from Hamburg, I was landed at the Lelirter Station 12 minutes before the schedule time, and I am told that similar experiences are not at all uncommon. Restaurant cars are found on all tho so-called “through” trains. They were formed by a . company during the war to take the place of the wagons lits. The fare they offer is good and abundant. Porters and cabs are no longer so difficult to find or so incalculable in their charges. As the services have been-greatly reduced, the third and fourth-class carriages are nearly always uncomfortably crowded, but tho enormous increase in fares has cased the pressure on other classes. In slow trains there is rarely lack of second class accommodation, and a first-class passenger can nearly awnys count on securing n seat. On the other hand, little lias as yet been done to refurnish the rolling stock. The upholstery is thread-bare, the woodwork cries out for paint, and a window with a strap is a noticeable exception. This is even the case oh express trains between the principal towns, and on some of the secondary lines the carriages are quite lamentable in their shabbiness.

Wliat is being done to polish up the railways is, no doubt, the work of the new Minister of Communications, General Groener, who made a great reputation for himself as a traffic manager during the war The speeding up of the trains is secured by punctuality premiums. Whether these are conipatiable with reasonable economy of coal is perhaps open to doubt. Many trains scorn to be run in duplicate even on local lines. Returning lo Berlin a few days ago from a small town about 40 or 50 miles away, I found that I could travel by an advance train which left 20 minutes before that scheduled in the time-table.

Shop stocks have expanded greatly during the past few months. When 1 left Germany, the outcry about the “clearance sale,” which it was said was going to drain the country of its wares, was at its height. At that. time bare windows and empty shelves seemed to justify the chorus of protest. Now there is no longer any lack of wares in the shops. Rather the contrary, for increase in supply has been accompanied by a falling-off in demand, and the holders of goods have in many cases been forced to moderate their prices in order to release their capital. This is particularly obvious in the leather trades. Shop-window announcements give notice of “quite enormous reductions” in hoots portmanteaus, hnnd‘bags, and purses. Some of these articles are now 1 being sold at not much than one-third the prices of six months ago. In clothing the drop has not been nearly so pronounced. ( The replacement of foreign goods by those of home manufacture is very obvious. At the beginning of the year the better tobacconists’ shops showed little else hut English cigarettes in their windows. These have now almost completely appeared. They have been driven out by the high prices resulting from the fall of the mark, and also to some extent by the rescrudescence of the cigar. At the beginning of the year cigars were very scarce, and queues could be seen daily outside the shops where the cheaper varieties were sold. Now cigars are abundant and a good deal cheaper.

' In the confectioners' windows one notices at once that German chocolate is fast expelling its foreign rivals. 'A year ago such a. thing as German chocolate did not exist. On the other hand, the whole country seemed to l>e inundated with foreign chocolate. It was piled yards high in shop window's, hawked in the streets from trays and barrow's and lustily cried on the railway stations. Most of it was Swiss or Dutch, but certain British, French, and American firms were well represented. The old German makes seem to be well up to their former quality, and just as in England, there is a large number of now brands, which nobody over heard of before the war. Doubtless it is the shortage of sugar which has made

chocolate so popular a sweetmeat. Though the prices of some other articles j of food have risen, the general tendency . has been slightly downward. i Of course temporary improvements on tlie surface mean very little so long as j Germany as a iState can be kept going . only by the printing press and a con- ( tinual watering of her currency. Tn many cases, too, what appear to he favourable symptoms are really consequences of the industrial slump, which has already largely increased unem-

ployment, and may assume very serious dimensions before the winter is over. Another change which does not augur well for the future is tlie aggravation of tlie bitterness against France. Al-

most every German man or woman, with whom I have talked since my return to this country has given spontaneous expression to this feeling. Sixmonths ago it was confined to a comparatively small political section of the population. Now it seems to be the common property of the entire people. It is recreating the feeling of national unity which was almost completely destroyed by the war and the revolution. A year ago the Germans directed llieir hatred almost exclusively against one another. Now the. first brewing is reserved for the French and the Poles. Open expressions of animosity against Die British are very rare. Tin's is fai

from being morely the result of selfinterested' calculation or interpretation of our policy. It is rather the echo from those portions of .the occupied area where w e rule the roost. The alleged excesses of the French colonial troops against women and children and the support supposed to he given by France to the Poles in Upper Silesia from the main ammunition of the Frnncophohe agitation. Whether it is politic to compose Germany’s domestic dissensions and familiarise her population with the idea of the inevitability of another war is n question which cannot be discussed here, but these things could almost certainly have been avoided without forfeiting any material benefits.