WOMAN'S WORLD.

Taranaki Daily News, 1 June 1918, Page 6

WOMAN'S WORLD.

t; PERSONAL ITEMS. j Mrs Metk, of Auckland, who has been! the guest of .Mrs iPomtt, of Stratford, spent a few days in 2\ew Plymouth on her return home. * « B • Mm and Miss Brewster are on a short \ | visit to Auckland. • » « •' Mi as Remit: II left this weak for a holiday in Auckland. # -* » ♦ j Mrs Percy Mitchell, with hier two! sons, who has .been holiday-making in New Plymouth lias now returned to Auckland. • • * » Mrs Rankin, of Wanganui, who las been visiting New Plymouth, returns to-day. • • • • Mr. and Mrs of Oamaru, spent a few days in New 'Plymouth on theiT way to Auckland. Miss Shillington, of Auckland, lias been the guest of Miss StephensonSmith, and left on Wednesday for Wanganui. .•• • » Misses Fookes are the guests of Mrs Hamerton, Inglewood. « « • • Miss Ease is spending a holiday in Auckland. » • • • Mrs Allan Kennell has returned from a short visit to her sister in Hawera. * * • • Mrs Percy Webster returned last I Wednesday from a trip to Wellington. • • • • Miss 0. Mackay has returned from Auckland. if • « • Mrs Wake, of Auckland, who has been viaiting her daughter at Stratford has now returned. • » » • Mrs Sam. Teed, who has been on a visit to Auckland, has now returned to New Plymouth. • » • • Mrs McNaughton Christie is visiting her mother, Mrs Reg. Bayley. • • • » Mrs E. Cntfield, of Eketahuna, is visiting New Plymouth. » * * • Miss M. Evans has returned to Hamilton after spending some weeks with her parents in New Plymouth. ♦ » » • Miss Estelle Nolan, who has been the guest of Mrs L. A. Nolan; has now retained to Auckland. • » • • Mrs Ralph Colson left on Wednesday for a visit to Auckland. • • • • Miss Billens has returned from 'Palmerston North. • • • • Miss Ernie Baily left last Saturday to take up her duties as pobationer in the Wellington Hospital. t * » • Miss M. Free, who has been visiting Mre. lies. Jacob, Te Ruiti, has now returned.

AFTERNOON TEA. The veterans entertained the ladies of the Patriotic Committee at a delightful afternoon tea held at May and Arrowsmith's Tea Booms last Thursday. Mrs F. G. Evans and Mrs G. P. Robinson acted as hostesses, and Mrs Burgess (Mayoress) made a charming little speech thanking the veterans for a most enjoyable afternoon. The musical programme, for which Mr. Alan Veale was responsible, was thoroughly appreciated. Amongst those present were Mcsdames Dockrill, J. Wilson, Eberlet, W. Ambury, Austin, R. Cock, G. Nealc, Ewing, F. Footc, Bartley, Fargie, Knight, W. Webster, Black, F. Hooker, Brooking, Watt, Asher, R. Ambury, Short, and Sols; Misses Sole, Roy, D. Bradbury; Cutfield, Hartnell, Collis and others. On 4th July the High School Old Girls intend holding an entertainment at the Good Templar's Hall. The musical part of the programme is under the able guidance of Mrs Wilkes, and the second part of the programme will consist of a farce in which all the parts are filled by Old High School Girls. The proceeds of this entertainment are to be given to Miss Grant to distribute as she thinks fit amongst the wounded New Zealand boys in the Old Country. Miss Grant has devoted all her time since leaving New Zealand to war work, and the money sent to her will be well epent for "the BoyB." THE GERMAN WOMEN. SOME TOTES. ■(By J. W. Gerard, formerly American Ambassador in Berlin). Even the women, many of whom are honorary colonels to regiments, must keep in trim for the great parade days of autumn and spring. Many of these female colonels appear in uniform, riding at the head of their regitaents. They sit on side-saddles, however, and wear skirts corresponding somewhat in colour with the uniform coat an<J helmet of the regiment of which they are the honorary proprietors. German female royalties are rather inclined to set an example of quietness in dress. They seldom wear the latest fashion and never follow the exaggerated modes of Paris. Even their figures are of the old-fashioned variety—pinched at the waist. Many German noblewomen shoot and are quite as good shots as tlieir husbands. I was quite surprised once oil a shooting party to meet an elderly princess whose grey hair was in short curls and who wore a coat and waistcoat like a man's. She shot with great skill and smoked long Havana cigars! When German women get out of the country they very quickly imitate foreign fashions and extravagances ot dress. .... Tho position of women in the social scale is fixed by the husband's rank. There is therefore none of that striving, that vying with each other, which so often exhausts the nerves of the American women and the purse of the husband. The German women give their time and attention to the "Four KV that, in a German's eyes, should bound a woman's world, "Kaiser, Blinder, Kirche, Kuthe" (Emperor, children, church, and kitchen). When I came to Germany I found, on studying the language, that there was 110 word in German corresponding to "efficient." I soon learned that this is became everything done in Germany Is -done efficiently, and there is no need to differentiate one act from another in tama of efficiency. But the German Mfc wtfr-imt-W-a* fffieient «»It* us*

doubtedly is without the wholehearted devotion of the German woman.

[ German girls are given a good, strong, sound education. They learn languages, not smatterings of Lliem. They are ac•complisbed musicians. Domestic science they learn from tlieir mothers. They are splendid swimmers, hockey player*, riders and skaters. Girls of the working classes, instead of flirting or turkey trotting at night, make a practice of going to the Turnvereins to evercise in the gymnasiums there. If the members of the German lower classes only had the opportunity to rise in life what would they not accomplish! So many of them are very ambitious, persistent, earnest, and thrifty. Of course female suffrage in Germany, or anything approaching it, is very distant. First of all, the men must win a real ballot for themselves in Prussia, a real representation in the Reichstag. Li the Germany of to-day, a woman with feminist aspirations is looked on as the men of the official class look on a Social Democrat, something hardly to be endured. And this is in spite of the fact that the nations to the North, Scandinavia, freed women even before America did.

The chief lady of the Imperial Court is Countess Brockdorff. She is rather stern in appearance and manner, and rumour has it that she was appointed to keep the good-natured, easy-going Empress to the strict line of German court etiquette, to see that the Empress, rather democratic in inclination, did not Etray away from the traditional rigidity of the Prussian Royal House. There are in Germany many mediatized families, so-called because at one time they possessed royal rank and rights over small bits of territory be- J fore Napoleon changed the map of Europe and wiped out so many small principalities. At the Congress of Vienna these families who lost their right of rule, in part compensation, were given the right to marry either royalties or commoners; so that a marriage of a (Prince of Prussia with a daughter of one of these mediatized houses would not be inorganic. The girl would take the full rank of her husband and the children would inherit any rights, including the rights to the throne, possessed by him. Berlin is certainly the gossip headquarters of the world. Some years ago the whole town was invaded by a mania for anonymous letter writing, and when the smoke had cleared away few were left with unriddled reputations.

It is the fashion of the present Court, however, to be very puritanical. _No such little affairs are going on publicly as have occurred in the annals of the Hohenzollcrn family. For even the present Kaiser, had numerous love affairs. The tree is still pointed out near the Tierparten where he met Princess Radziwiil eveTy day. And the Chancellor's palace wae once the home of another royal "friend."