How the War Has Changed Society.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 5, Issue 207, 8 September 1916, Page 2 (Supplement)

How the War Has Changed Society.

By His Grace the DUKE OF MANCHESTER.

Society people—or at least certain cf them—gained an unenviable reputation for wanton and idle extravagance which earned for them the contempt of the working classes. Was this only a veneer which has been rubbed off when real national trouble came? The Duke of Manchester, who, by virtue of his social position, »s perhaps lietter qualified than anyone c!se to speak, gives his candid opinions in the following article.

The Editor asks me what are the true amusements of society, and what changes the war has wrought in the lives of its members ? At present tha society of the Allied countries, and presumably still more so Germany and Austria, are not looking for amusements. Work, strenuous work, is the order of the day. Amusements are the necessity of tho idle, and at present society has no time for rest, let alone idleness. The women are nursing, munition mak : ng, sawing, knitting, runnin cantees ad clubs for soldiers o leave. What few men are not fighting are doing Red Cross work, m unit''on work, drilling volunteers. There is neither time, money nor inclination for amusement. But I suppose Mr. Editor is referring to amusements in peace time. Let's see, in the dim ages before the war, what was the life of society. Well, as far as I remember in England it was something like this: It was divided roughly for amusement purposes into tho Parliamentary enthusiasts, the hunting people, and the more-idle-stills. The Parliamentary enthusiasts came to London after Christmas for the opening of Parliament and, with the Easter Recess and a Whitsun Recess. stayed in London four days a week t ; ll August. The four days in town were spent in a certain amount of unnecessary shopping, a certain amount of lunching out, a considerable abount of card leaving, a large amount of bridge.

union say to nn eighteen-hour clay an 1 no pay for overtime? THE GREATEST ENJOYMENT COMES FROM WORK. A friend of mme, with a gift for figures, has worked out for me the interesting fact that the energy expended hy a society woman on society in one year was enough to lift Buckingham Palace nine and a quarter inches oh" the ground and hold it ther for fortytlm a seconds I believes this thoroughly, though 1 have no means of checking it, as I have never been able to persuade & society woman to try—perhaps the King and Queen wouldn't like it! So much for what society does —but what, if any, of all these things amuse them ? I think the answer, perhaps, is: All of them for the arst two or three years, and by that time the round has becom? such a habit that nothing but physical exhaust : on will loosen the grip tliouga the pleasure fades into irksome duty, and.finally into positive d'seomfort. When young, you enjoy the novelty of it. the contrast to the schoolroom, the chance of using up exuberant vitality. You enjoy it because you aro young, healthy, vigorous and open to enjoyment. Later, ambition to gtvo entertainment that others will enjoy, desire to be thought a good fellow, a pleasant guest, to make things go off, buoys you up. But I have come to the concluVon that the hardest work is the pursuit of pleasure, and the greatest enjoyment conies from work, which is a paradoi and a vicious circle, and other weird things of a, philosophical nature, an I, above all, an unsatisfactory conclusion, but the only one at which I can arrive. That was what took place before the war! What of afterwards r My prophetic eye, gazing into the future, shows me a very different stat:» of affa'rs. The hectic search for pleasure which had become a fixed habit, hai disappeared at the rude shock of war, and the wherewithal for the pursuit hm disappeared with fallen securities and risen taxes.

A CEASELESS ROUND OF GAIETY. From mid-January to mid-April small dinners, occasional small dances, and tho theatres; mid-April to mid-July urge dinners, large dances every n'ght, political receptions, and the opera. Friday, or Saturday till Monday, a weekend in the country, golf, gossip and bridge ' August brought Scotland and the be. g : nning of the shooting round; Cowes and the end of the yachting season til! Dartmouth in September, or the. Continent.

Th.9 hunting crowd's real year began with the cub huntino- In September and about Easter with the end < f hunting. During this period they lived a life to themselves, the women becoming more weather-beaten as the sea. son want'on.

It is true that, probably, there wiil lie a new society of war-profit millionaires to hunt the old Pleasure Chase back. But the old society? They wll jiavo neither the inclinat on nor the mono*'.

They seldom left their own stampinggrounds during tlrs p,eriod, and then only with gloomy faces on account of frost. While the hunting season endured they hunted from breakfast til' taa, tried to get over it from tea ti!! dinner, from dinner till bedtime played Ijridge and occasionally, I believe, flirted. The nights in England in winter are often raw and chilly. Lastly, we had the more-idle-st lis. Their year had no definite startingplace, unless, possibly, what used to be the London season from May on ti'! August, or rather Goodwood at the end of July.

SOCIETY AFTER THE WAR. Already the great game of war economy has arisen in the land, and I hear countesses discussing sheepshead pics, and the mysteries of hash; dukes and duchesses patronise the ''pictures' 1 instead of the theatres. Each day. both of necessity and perhaps with a certain enjoyment of th<* novelty, some further luxury, wh'-ch used to be a necessity, is dispensed with, and, if it goes on much longer, J seo a vision of society, after the war, trudging home after their daily toil at what thejr previous experience had lifted them for —the older men from the gas works, the dowager from matchmaking at Bryant and May's, the young man from " nutting," and so on —quick wash and brush up and then round to the ""Pig and Whistle "in response to an invitation which may read something like this: "The Duke and Duchess of Blankshire request the pleasure of the Marquis and Marchioness Poor'town on Tuesdav, March 7th, at 8 p.m., at the Pig and Whistle.'

Week-end parties, balls, dinner*, opera, lunches, calling, bridge, Raneiagh, Hurlingham, Roehampton, a week oi' ten days at Ascot (just as haul work), and then a cure or Cowes, Deauville, more dinners with gambling, bathing, dancing, dining and scandal, and back to a round of shooting patties, each week in a different house til! after Christmas; then off to Cannes - , Biarritz, Nice, Pau or Monte Carlo t'i April, then Paris for clothes. How any conscientious society worker lived through these tim.es will probably never bo known. It is most unfair —the Society Trades Union is the worst managed of all What would any other

Winkles and stout. 1 ' —"Pearson's Weekly."