A WORD TO WOMEN.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 1740, 26 July 1917, Page 4

A WORD TO WOMEN.

A CORRESPONDENT'S AP- ’ PEAL. The following letter has been received from a correspondent, and the remarks she makes should do something to make people realise that this is no time to slacken any effort that makes tor the comfort of our soldier?, whether they are fighting at the front or in hospital at Home. If by any strange chance there arc yet people to be found who have not bestirred themselves on their behalf, the facts she mentions should make them lose no further time in doing what they can for those men who arc fighting so bravely for homes and country and civilisation itself. The letter is as follows: —“With your permission (he following remarks are addressed to all who arc not working to their fullest ability for the needs of our soldiers. Information recently received, both public and private, lends to the fact that the pinch of want will be fell much more acutely than hitherto. One officer, writing about April, says —‘There is very little wool in England. . . . the men welcome food parcels. ... It is weeks since we had potatoes at our' mess. We get little sugar, and are cautioned to waste no bread.' Supplementing the food supply is possibly left to individual friends, but an appeal for knitted comforts in greater quantities should not lull on deaf ears. If there is little wool in England it is no use relying on the British Government. They cannot make bricks without straw. Parcels sent from New Zealand are not nearly sufficient for the men in the trenches. Lots are east for them, and it is quite likely that those who don't gel them have no friends- to supply them. Is it not lime to put away the pretty eyelet-hole embroidew and crochet work, and realise that those brave kinsmen who are lighting to the death for us will suffer severely from frost-bile if dainty (rides are allowed lo lake precedence of comforters, caps, waistcoats, mittens, and, above all, seeks. Fur a man is helpless, indeed a drag, if his feel are not in good condition. Possibly the ever-rising price of wool is partly the reason women and girls are not knitting. That is an unnecessary hardship, and should have been legislated against earlier, for our soldiers arc by it the chief sulTorers. But, even so, it is a straight-out duly to do the little one can for those who are doing so much for us. —Honour of New Zealand.”