"ALIEN'S" LETTER FROM ENGLAND.

Otago Witness, Issue 2815, 26 February 1908, Page 75

"ALIEN'S" LETTER FROM ENGLAND.

(Specially Written for the Wit_ess Ladies' Page.) IN ICE AND SNOW.

The anticyclone -which set in early in j the New Year, "not only enlarged its sphere of influenoe," as the weather report* put it, " but became more intense" — «o intense and cruelly keen, with its northeast blast, that men and women were' frozen to death in the streets, and the old and ill-nourished «tied in. their homes. Dartmoor, that wild moor of Devon where the prison dominates the landscape, waa deep in snow, and so violent were the gusts of^ bitter" wind in, London that a club window wasMblown in in Trafalgar square. At Cardiff a, workman waa found in a ditch where he had fallen dead, with his clot>hes encased in ice an inch thick. A postman, was also found dead from exposure. In Scotland, Yorkshire, Staffordshire, and the Feu Country . there were many deaths. In London as the result of exposure there were many j cases in the hospitals, infirmaries, and workhouses, with cruel suffering for those practically homeless — that is, firekfs and food'less,' herded together in wretebed tenements, with the crazy roof between * them and the storm. In other places there were 4 burst water pipesj burst kitchen boilers, and skating, j with many fatalities. With 23 degrees j of frost on January 4 in Sussex, and TJon- ' don 11 degrees colder than Bodoe, within > the Arctic Circle, the poet of the Daily j ■Mail may be excused for his protest ! against the treatment of the New Year. j Clerk of out British weather, pray, excuse me If I prefer the usual complaint, But I protest the way in which you use me Would ruffle up the feelings 'o t ' a saint. j — X— know we asked for weatb/T that was seasonable, But this Antarctic climate isn't reasonable. It may have seemed to you a pleasant practice To freeze the water in my morning bath. I Some people .might enjoy it, but the fact is j Such pranks arouse in me a speechless ' wrath. ' i Yet not quite speechless; when I slipped and . fell on it I I said— but there, 'tis better not to dwell on '-. •* . ! You wish, mo doubt, to see me buying madly New skates and ski, some reindeer and a ' sleigh. f , On which- I know that you would have me i badly By switching on a week as mild as May. ; At such a price I, quite decline to mollify you, And as* a base blackmailer I must qualify you. There is another matter altogether Of which the N.S.P.C.C. shall hear. You are exposing in this bitter weather ■ A tender little babe^our sweet New Year. ' \ It's bad .enough for us to go about in it, But fancy keeping such a youngster out in it ! Say that you did your worst. Well, then, supposing " { The child should die, you would repent , your sin. ' ' How could you keep your premises from closing . i ; Without a y*ar to run th« weather in? ! . "Remember, pray, how you have used . him ' recently, - : And try to treat the little fellow decently. ' — Touchstone. The only way that I could keep from '■ freezing was to "sit with a tug round my • knees at the fire and read the reports ! 1 S>f the Australian v. England cricket match, played, with the thermom?ter , registering 140 degrees in the sun! ! There was. a skating week-end for those.' j who love the sport, and some merry scenes to be found all over England. . In London f at the Wimbledon ponds there were hun- [ '] dreds on the ice' on- Saturday afternoon, !., and Sunday ; and scores at Earlsfield and on the waters of ' the Lon- | don parks — at Hyde Park especially ( on the round pond, and the Serpentine. - -"The Windsor Great Park (Virginia ' Water), Hampton, and Richmond ponds ■were not safe, but Weybridge and A«cot ' and Hendon were all fit foT skating. 3la,ny ] private waters on country estates afforded ' < the house-party guests great sport. The J < river at Cambridge was frozen, and the j ' boat practice had to be postponed. Dairy- j ] men found the milk in the cans frozen | 1 as it came up from the country, and for ! , tie matter of that, householders found it 1 frozen .in. the cans left at the doors in < the mornings. ] -Or-course. the price of coal went up. The demand for not foods and soups at " "the -railway restaurants was enormous, ) j curries and Irish ©tews being among the ; , favourite dishes. What a satire for the ' ( hungry poor to read the advice of the j 1 newspapers : | ' The reason why people require more food ' , during the winter is that all tissue change j throughout the body is increased *by cold , ■weather. It has been proved by experiment . ' -that the amount of food just sufficient to ' , ieep the body weight stationary during i winter will cau^e an" increase in weight if • j taken during the summer. Whi'e there should" be during the winter an increase in ] all kinds of food, whether 1 proteids, carbohydrates, or fats, it is the latter element ' , that the cold weather increase should be most marked. * ■ j During cold weather the body is continually ( losing heat, and plenty of fats, the heat pro- „ ducers of our diet, must be consumed to keep ( up the supply. Most people manage this* , seasonal variation of their amount of fat „ food's quite unconsciously. In the hot wea- t their the appetite suggests lean beef and ealad. - On a cold day, without deliberate ( reasoning, the choice, may be a rich beefsteak f pudding. Here the suet will supply the-heat-' ] producing- fat for. which the body tissues are \ mutely appealing. _ ' j i Then came a quick weather change — a - ' thaw and a day as mild as April, with i slush under foot. ,On the greasy road- . ' •ways horses went down and motor omni- , buses skidded. The ice thawed, and i ska-tens who bad prepared for a good time < bad uncomplimentary remarks to pass < concerning the management of the wea- } ther. For days the ill-clad and the hun- , J gry crept out of cover, but yesterday a | bHczsrd of wind and snow and rain swept , Uko •outherh countries, and there was a "• i

snowfall of six inches. Then the snoTi change^ to rain, aiid there was a deluge ', with thunder and lightning in man] places. In the fierce seas a number o: wrecks were recorded. I The blizzard passed directly over Lou | don, and .the weight of snow in the earlj ! morning on the wires threw the fire alarn ' system out of order. Bells rang, and ou into the bitter darkness the gallant Fir* Brigade men rushed hither and thithei for no reason,- save the snow. The snow had the presumption to stop Big Ben a| eight minutes to 6, -while darkness ,ye^ hung over the city."- Till midday -this king of time-recorders was silent, it* fact wreathed in snow. Fourteen wrecks with loss of life is th( immediate record of the sea. The worst of the storm seems to have beet off the .north-east coast and the Firth o j Forth, whence there is a long Hat 'of wrecks with slight loss of lire. •While 15 of. the crew of the Cory steamei Nellie Wise were rescued by the rocket ap paratus *t Haxtlepool, Newland, the seeom I mate, was drowned. Seven men were landec in the breeches buoy from the trawler Dun robin. Lashed to the rigging «, Danisl I skipper brought his schooner in. I The Norwegian steamer Norfolk was driver ! ashore at the mouth of the Tyne on ,^h« | Black Midden, the scene of the famous wreck of the Stanley. Her steering-gear already once repaired, broke down pr«cticallj at the pier-head, and lour of the crew bravelj crawled to the stern to steer her by hand, but in vain. The cTew of 18 were rescued ' by the lifeboat. The crew of the steamer* Sentinel, ashore I on Spittal Beach, Berwick, were- saved by the rocket apparatus. Four Haddington 1 smacks were battered to pieces, and the yachi Eos was destroyed at North Berwick. The i Firth of Forth feny had to be stopped. I Even the new warship liord Nelson, which was to make her trials from Jarrow, had to put back before the gale. In the rescue of the crew of the large barque Europa, off Padstow, a boy named Fetucas was drowned. , One after the other the St. Ives lifeboat rescued, amid exciting scenes, the crewß of 'the coal schooners Lizzie Wilce aud Mary Barrow. The steamer, Sentry went ashore off Grreenock, and the ketch Confido was wrecked at ArklowJ four men being saved with difficulty. So\fierce was the gal« in the Channel that several of the^mail steamer services were suspended or amalgamated into a later one. The boat-trains arrived late, and the delay accentuated 'the inconvenience of the telegraphic breakdown. The Flushing mail packet Koningin Regentes had one of the worst passages .known, for many years. She steamed into Queenborough in the afternoon seven hours late. It is asserted, though it is hard for the well-fed to realise, that hundreds of hungry children going back to the schools after the Christmas holidays ate the • first proper meal they had 'had since the schools cl-ceed. The unanimous opinion of all the teachers is that were these free meals stopped many of these little ones would slowly starve to death, and whether the funds are raised by private subscription, as now, or paid for out of London's purse, it is contended the meals must go on. The plan of procedure is for the teachers to distribute tickets in the dinner-hour to those of their pupils who have no food at home, the, tickets varying in value according to the need* of the child or the funds at the disposal of the school. The twopenny, three halfpenny, and even halfpenny ticket the more or less favoured recipient exchanges at a depot in the district for a' meal. Right in the heart of that East End highway, the City road, stands the Alexandra Trust dining rooms, of special interest to the Queenf A Daily ; Mail reporter writes: When I got there yesterday, just after noon, numbers of little legs were already skipping up the staircase, numbers of gTimy little , hands were holding tight the precious pieces of paper which could be exchanged for hot, | comforting soup and tasty, filling jam-rolL Some had yellow tickets with l|d printed on them. These were to be regaled) on meat pie. The holders of white penny vouchers got a ; bowl of soup, a p'.ece of bread or scone, and a good lump of the jam-roll. Some had only the green halfpenny tickets, which meant either w soup or pudding, but not both. These last were from schools too poor to do more. As they shuffled in their broken boots, wet with the chilling slush, into the big, cheerful, ! airy dining room, they made straight for the 1 counter, where pleasant-faced young women, j with Jiusinees-like white aprons and rolled-up sleeves, were serving out dinners as hard as j they could. It was pretty to see how kindly and cheerily they spoke to their little cub- ! tomexs. '.' What's yours. John ?" " Where's your ticket. Tommy?' "Now, then, stand in a line, please, children. Everyone in turn, you knowjl" j A good few of the penny ticket holders demanded " Christmas pudden." I doubt if ; it was £o filling as the soup *cd jam-roll, '■ but you will understand their preference if you were ever a child yourself. The others took their soup-bowls covered by pl«tes con- , tainin? bread and steaming suet," and carried -them off carefully to one of the Jong tables.. The way they set to work to devour 1 them was the best possible evidence as to their need of the food. At one table there was a momentary shortage of spoons. A little chap with pinched cheeks and bright, ravenous eyes could not wait for the waitress^ He raised the basin to his famished little lips and drank to his heart's content. It is pathetic to notice that almost all the children, however ragged -their skirts or trousers, however thin and 1 threadbare' their poor little jackets, have had some attempt made to smarten them- up. Scarcely any little girl is without a ribbon in her hair, while the ! small boys' frayed collars or neatly arranged neck scarves bear testimony to their parents' anxiety to turn them out as well as they can. | They are charmingly friendly, these little diners. They have a ready smile for a stranger, and « very few moments' talk puts one on confidential terms with them. " I don't -generally come here Mondays," a mite with a mass of fair hair under a dirty white tam-o'-shanter tells me, " 'cos Mondays we ' generally has something left over from Sunday. But this* Sunday we didn't have no dinner — only bread and dripping, — so there jw«en't nothing to h*v« to-day/

1 i " And what would you have done," I »sk, "if you hadn't been given a dinrer ticket?" ! " I don't know," says the little mite. I am afraid I do know. She would have gone without, go would most of the others. At the best they would have had to content themselves coldly with " bread and drjpping." From the Alexandra Trust I drove through the dreary North-east London streets to Bethnal Green: There, in the Mowlem street school, 50 'little appetites are satisfied daily during term with good, wholesome food cooked on the premises by the students of the cookery class.- Dinner is almost done here. Generous helpings of batter pudding with sugar are being rapidly disposed of. Before that they had had stewed fish and po.tatoes. "Enjoyed your dinner?" I queried to a bright youngster with rosy cheeks. "Yes, sir, very much," he answered promptly. "And you'll- have your tea when you get home ?" " Hope so, sir." " Don't you always get it?" "No, sir, not always." "But you always get breakfast?" " No, not always," puts in the sympathetic school-keeper, who is beginning to clear away. " I've known him come in as '-ollow as a drum, and a lot more too," And yet this, the capable cookery mistress tells me, is not by any means the poorest school in the district. ' There is the best material in the world in our elementary schools, if" we will only give it a chance. And the way to give it a- chance is to seeyin the first place, that the children get enotffh to eat. Underfeeding is the most producer of wastrels, drunkards, criminals. It causes physical and mental degeneration. It fills our workhouses, asylum*, and gaols. Help to fight underfeeding. Help to banish from this England) of ours the reproach of the hungry child. The journal above-mentioned has distinguished itself in the cause of charity, an<T ' does not fail, after opening its columns for funds, to inform the publicof .the use to which its donations are put. The donations for the children's dinners •'have run into many thousands of pounds. The ex-Lord Mayor, who made his appeal reluctantly after the great and generous response of the public to. his Cripples' Home Fund, was yet enabled to send out his 7000 hampers to London's crippled children. At the head of all these chari- ' ties one sees his Majesty the King down I for £100 or £50, and the Queen and the Ppince and Princess of Wales follow- j ing with handsome/ sums. The royal example is followed by men and women and children throughout the land. | Right in the midst of these innumerable appeals comes that of Lord Roberts on behalf of the veterans of the Crimean and Indian Mutiny who, after gallant servioe, were spending the evening of their life in the workhouse. Their presentation last year to his Majesty at his levee'unearthed many' of them from obscurity. • The appeal /that a Veterans' Relief Fund should be established to enable these old soldiers, who won so much for Britain, .to end their days , in comfortable freedom ' be buried — not in a pauper's graye — met with the greatest enthusiasm. The fund is one day old. Yesterday it started with the King, £1050 ; the Queen, £525 ; the Prince of Wales, £262; and £1 each from the royal children. The Duke of Bedford followed with £1000! Lord Iveasch matched the Ring's donation (£1050), so also did Sir Ernest Cassel. These handsome donations were followed by smaller ones, and the first day'e con-" tribution to the funds is £5000. Mr T. H. Roberts, who is in intimate relations with the heroes' of Balaclava, says £1 per week each is necessary to keep these old soldiers in private comfort. But before it can be decided ,how much can be allowed them it must first be found' how' many are entitled to share t>he fund, and - what the sum contributed will ultimately realise.