Life in Sweden.

Levin Daily Chronicle, 10 January 1918, Page 4

Life in Sweden.

TEA AT 26/- A POUND

An Englishman living in Sweden gives a gloomy account of the state of affairs in that country. He wrote to a friend in London, asking if it were possible to send him tea, cocoa, jam, flour, and biscuits. Some of the following extracts are significant:— "Unless we get some foodstuffs released in England, I believe we are going to be in a state of starvation during the present winter. The question of getting coal here is really a serious matter. Works cannot be kept going, and there is huge unemployment. That, together with the high price of foodstuffs, is rendering the position almost untenable. The great difficulty at the moment is the firing question. The Government is storing very large piles of wood for distribution among the poor people, but they are making a charge of anything from 65 to 70 kroner per fathom, as against a prowar rate of 10 to 14 kroner. If wo have a severe winter it will be something terrible. "There is no doubt that there are things which have transpired in this country which arc not pleasant to England and our Government; but when you consider that over three-fourths of the people in Sweden are the workingclasses, and tliat they are. very poor, also that the Government are ruled by the minority, and the minority is more or less favourably disposed towards Germany, you can easily appreciate why people must suffer for the mistakes of the minority. Certain rumours are current all over the county, and if one can believe anything like the minutest fraction of the same, we are in for rather serious times in the very near future."

After various remarks of a political nature,'the writer says: —"I believe wc are in a very much worse state than any of the countries at war. I have my own flat here, and as the cost of foodstuffs is so exorbitant in restaurants, I have to arrange for coolcing in my own flat. What makes me anxious to have these goods from England is the fact that I have to pay 40 kroner per kilo for tea, whilst butter and milk are very difficult to get. Bread is practically black. Coffee, of which we use a very great deal, costs anything up to 24 kroner per kilo. In fact, we cannot get it even %,t that price. Jams are unobtainable. We cannot get anything on this list (mentioned above), and, as you know, they are almost indispensable to Englishmen."

At the present rate of exchange, according to the Englishman's letter, the price of tea in Sweden is within an ace of 26s per lb, and that of coffee 15s 6d per lb.