WOMAN'S WORLD

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 173, 31 October 1910, Page 6

WOMAN'S WORLD

(Conducted by "Eileen"). UTOPIA FOR FACTORY GIRLS. (By F. Z.'Moore in Dunedin Star). When in Berlin I visited the Girls' Home, situated in the factory portion of Berlin, and intended for homeless girls working in the surrounding factories. The home was founded and endowed by the daughter of a Lord Mayor of Berlin, Previously, a girl working in a factory on a small wage, say, of 10s a week had to find the cheapest of lodgings, and, in order to get them at as low a figure as possible, very often arranged to occupy them only partially, the room she occupied being otherwise utilised when she was away. The result was that she often had to stay out on the street late of an evening, and on a holiday or Sunday she might have to go out on the street all day; or, if allowed to stay in the house j or the room of the people she boarded with, she might be obliged to put up with uncongenial company, the result often being prejudicial to her health, not to speak of her moral welfare. The home is a large new building, divided into Hats, and subdivided into rooms measuring about Bft by 12ft. These rooms have to be (and are) kept spotlessly clean by the girls to whom they are let, and they are generally decorated with flowers. There is a housekeeper for each flat, and each flat has its sitting room (with a piano), and also its bath (for which Id is charged) and a place for the girls to iron their dresses — hot irons being obtained by putting a penny in the slot. By this means the girls are able to keep themselves smart in the summer. Connected with the house are a library, a dining-room, and a restaurant, where hot food can be got at all time. For breakfast a. girl gets a roll and coffee and butter for Id, her lunch costs 3d or 4d (three courses);, and her tea about 2d (she only pays for what she gets, and can go anywhere); while for the nice room she occupies 5s a month is paid; so that, if you work it out, a factory girl can practically live in a beautiful, clean, tidy club for 19s a month, made up as follows:—Price of room per month, ss; food, at Od a day, 3s Od a week or 14s a month. Her wages, says at 10s a week, are £2 for one month, so that she has 21s over foT dresses, baths, outings, etc. It may be asked: How does this work ? "Does it not teach the girls to carry themselves above their station in life, so that on marriage they will be discontented? It has been found that it has the reverse effect. It has made the girl proud of herself, and to see her room, with its neatness and its lovely flowers, is enough to convince anyone of this, and charm the heart of any man. Instead of the girls feeling themselves in the way, or having to walk the streets and feel small, so to speak, they take an interest in themselves, do their own dressmaking, and keep themselves as tidy as possible. There are culture clases in connection with the Home which the girls may attend if they wish to improve themselves, I had the privilege of seeing some of the residents—working girls earning small wages—but their style, decorum and dress were such that it is a pleasure to observe them. On their getting married they take into their homes a culture, a neatness, and a tidiness that last them through life.

It is said that these girls make good, frugal, tidy wives—wives of whom their! , husbands are proud, and possessing some 1 spirit and a keen interest in life—contrasting most favorably with the lot of those wives whose working girlhood was passed in unhealthy conditions—perhaps with a family of six in two rooms, arid forced, as in most cases they were to roam about the streets on Sundays and holidays, and very often of an evening Needless to say, "the 200 beds are occupied and there are many applicants, llie Lord Mayor's daughter who has devoted her life to the work, is loved and revered in Berlin, and such is the fame of the home that ladies are glad to pay to enter it and be trained so that they may be able to stake up similar work in other places.

THE CHAIN-MAKERS. Miss Mary R. Macarthur writes in the Christian Commonwealth on the chainmakers of Cradley Heath, and in noticing the monotony of the work and its misei° able remuneration, tells that a yard of chain may he made in an hour,' of the commoner kinds even two yards or more. • but to the onlooker, noticing anxiously' the exertions of the worker, this hour! seems unending. It will have brought the operatives perhaps a penny; in fewer I cases a penny halfpenny. If she be oiftwi. indeed a very Vulcan of chain-makers, she will earn twopence. Such lean reward makes certain the employment of children, and the shadow of their lifeIon? prison-house rests on these in mere babyhood. At the moment some 800 of the workers have been locked out. The manufacturers themselves estimate that to earn 10s a week on a chain a worker must weld over 5000 links. Each link re-1 quires at least ten blows from the ham-J mer. A week's work means, then, more' than 50,000 blows. And then the bellows'* must be blown, the forge attended to the iron rods lifted. The iron must be earned from warehouse to workshop and the finished chain carried back again. And for tins the women ask 10s To many of them that spells riches One woman reckoned the other day that at the old prices she had to strike a thousand blows to earn three-halfpence! "STERILISED BABY." The excess of precautions in the upbringing of Betty Tanner, a flve-vear-old ' Lalifornian heiress, widely known as the • sterilised baby," has caused the separa- i tion of her parents (writes a New York ' correspondent). The child's mother has 1 just obtained a divorce at Los Angles s on the ground of the "neglect" of the M Iwby's father. The real source of the s t f-"r ) ,L i n,w lt Sh ? is eXpected t0 "herit I j ±.0,000,000 from her grandmother, who J

is a daughter of Jeremiah Millbank, the Xcw York banker. But the grandmother has announced that if she has no grandchildren the millions will go to charity. Extraordinary precautions are thus taken to ensure little Betty's health. The mnnsion near Los Angeles—the "city of perpetual summer"—and the ground near have been sterilised. The air the baby breathes, and her toys, food and clothes are thoroughly autisepticiscd before they are allowed to reach her. Her father declared that he was not allowed to take the child on his lap and kiss her. The atmosphere became finally too rarefied for him three years ago, and he departed. He is now travelling in the East. COIFFURE FASHIONS. There is nothing so arbitrary now in the coiffure fashions for women and girls, states a London exchange. A bevy of fifty damsels came my way the other day, and really no two had dressed their liair exactly alike, not even in front, in: which position there is apt to be a gc*n- \ eral air of similitude. There was the i damsel with a fringe, and the damsel with a centre parting demurely stroked down to hide the ears. One girl had looped her hair in curtains, coming downwards to her eyebrows and upward again, and another had arranged a drapery that revealed half her forehead and hid the other half. A noticeable characteristic all shared, and that was a flat crown, in some cases absolutely so, in others raised only by a plait or a twist of tresses. It was observable also that the ribbon fillet was evidently very generally admired, and that it was passed round the head, in maiy instances, low upon the forehead. What a demure and wise air that gives to a girlish face, and how becoming it is! BARBAROUS MILLINERY. A STRONG PROTEST. Not a plume or a feather adorned the hats of members of the Women's Political Association, Melbourne, last week. The main business of the evening was to protest against the destruction of bird life for the adornment of women's head wear. Miss Vida Goldstein, who presided, said women were always attacked when the question of bird life destruction came up. It was said that the vanity of women was responsible. She maintained that it was mainly due to the insensate desire to profit on the part of those who provided women's hats. If women only considered what a slaughter of birds resulted they would not degrade themselves by wearing such hats. Mr. A. K. Mattingley, member of the committee of the Ornithological Union, delivered a lecture on '"Destruction of Australian Bird Life." Many thousands of pounds' worth of work was done annually for the Commonwealth by the birds, he said. They were Nature's insecticide. Yet among the most useful the destruction was greatest. At one London auction as many as 150,000 kingfishers were submitted, some of which were Australian. By the aid of a series of excellent photographic slides he illustrated a visit which he had paid to the swamps about the Edward river, New South Wales, arid of the numerous birds which were shown there were few, he said, which did not suffer at the hands of the plumage seeker, whatever the value of the bird as a check upon insect pests. The following resolution was carried:—"That this Association pledges itself to assist the Ornithologists' Union and the Bird Observers' Club in the protection of bird life, and urges that legislation should be introduced against firms for offering for sale such barbarous millinery, as well as against the women who wear it."