MARKETING IN FRANCE.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 1596, 10 August 1916, Page 4

MARKETING IN FRANCE.

HOW IT STRIKES A NEW ZEALANDER.

INTERESTING comparisons BY A KEEN OBSERVER.

Sergt. Cecil S. Robertson, sou of Mr Geo. Robertson, of the Government Insurance Department, and son-in-law of Mr and Mrs F. Robinson, Beach Road, Foxton, gives his impressions of the way marketing is done in Franco in the following interesting letter: — “The last trip I happened by luck to arrive in Boulogne' on Mark’d Day, and was greatly interested in the way that the housewives purchase their fish and week’s supply of perishable provisions. At an early hour the peasants from the surrounding districts begin to arrive in town in their quaint coveredin carts, and start arranging their Wires in stalls .and on the pavements of the market square. By nine o’clock the market is in full swing, and the square is packed with a good-natured babbling crowd seeking the stall where the best value is to be had for a franc.

“First we come to the stalls where poultry is to be bought, all plucked and ready for the pan. One old woman has already sold out, as her prices were a few centimes cheaper than her neighbours’, but all the other stalls are doing a nourishing trade. Next are the stalls where all manner of cheeses are to be had, from small (‘ream cheeses the size of a cake of soap to big flat ones the size of a bicycle wheel. They smell most appetising and are finding a ready sale. Then we come to the vegetables, so very clean and fresh, lettuces, carrots, asparagus, spring onions, beans, peas, and new potatoes. Here trade is very brisk, and many stalls arc already depleted. Cherries and strawberries there are in abundance, and such beautiful fruit, red and luscious. I have never seen anylhing to approach them in New Zealand. They are selling like hot cakes, but they are cheap, and there are more than enough for everybody. Then there are the slabs of (lowering pot plants, and cut 1 lowers, masses of bloom, and a great sight. They are eagerly sought after. Old women, will) their baskets of eggs, butter, and honey, preserves and all manner of homemade commodities, are squatting everywhere. It is a great sight, and one cannot help Blinking what a boon a weekly market of this deseription, where one eonld buy all these things, knowing them to be perfectly (dean and wholesome, would be in New Zealand.

“All day long in the streets one hears the quaint call of the fish girls hawking (heir wares, which they carry in large baskets held up by a strap across (heir cheats. They arc quaint figures in their planted skirts, small polo* bonnet's and wooden shoes. 1 visited the fish market and watched the excitement for some lime; it was very inicresting, hut too noisy and smelly to stay long. Everything was spotlessly clean and fresh, and all fish, from young sharks and skales to soles and mackerel, found a ready sale. -New Zealand is a long way behindhand in the way of the distribution of foodstuffs, and it is a shame (hat good markets are not established in each town, where the housewife could buy direct instead of buying in stuffy and dirly shops, where the goods pass through several hands, each making a. profit and in (he majority of cases they are anything but fresh. We have a lot to learn, especially in the cultivation line.

“There is, ns yon know, little or no waste* space in this country. We motored down hero this time, and I got a good idea of (lie rural parts. Paddocks of peas, hroad beans, clover, and lucerne, all looking' at their best, and the wheat and oats just beginning to be touched by the sun. The country is lovely at present, and the harvest is bound to be good. All Hie work is being done by women and old men, for, of course, all I lie young men are away lighting. Another thing that struck me was the quantity of wild dowers one sees by the roadside. We had a breakdown about twenty kilometres south of Ht. Omer, and I got out and wandered in the fields. I picked dasies, buttercups, forget-nm-nots, cowslips, and dozens of (lowers I did not know. I also picked and ate wild strawberries and cherries. 1 struck one old friend sorrel, but it was not much in evidence. 1 would like to get loose there with a gun and dog, for, just walkinground the edge of some woods, 1 put up three brace of partridges and two cock pheasants. The absence of unsightly fences is very noticeable, hawthorn hedges are everywhere and all ] w blossom, pone of the old barbeil wire or post and rail fences are to he' seen anywhere.”