CHRISTMAS IN BERLIN.

Taranaki Daily News, 19 March 1921, Page 9

CHRISTMAS IN BERLIN.

SHOPLIFTING PREVALENT. Cabling from Berlin in December, the correspondent of the New York Times stated:—Th-fe Is IHtk- business in the large department. s'>es and wehuiwe* where the masses buy their Christmas presents, but the smaller and more select establishments catering to the aristocracy, the plutocracy, and the numerous newly rich, who have not yet found their place in society, are always thronged with buyers, to whom money is no object. Shop windows of the latter places might vie with all the glories displayed in Christmas seasons before the war. There are Canton silks, Venice vases, laces, Viennese leather goods, sparkling diamonds, and marvellous pearls, but the prices are so monstrously high that the shopkeepers do not put them on the goods displayed in the windows, partly, perhaps, because the would-be buyers might be frightened, partly for fear their costliness might induce unwelcome customers to visit their places. Indeed, shoplifters, despite numerous daily arrests, have become a plague, and never have there been so many burglaries in the fashionable stores. Criminals from the impoverished pre-war fashionable world, furnish a large contingent.

Last night the police caught three men entering the Leipziger Strasse emporium, two managed to escape, the third did not seem to hurry and was capturqd. He was a poor, dilapidated individual, protesting he met the other two men as they were leaving one of the many places, when for a few marks they hired him to carry a few packages./ He had accompanied them to the Leipziger Strasse emporium, never dreaming they were burglars. The suspicious policeman took the poor fellow to the dancing palace mentioned, and there soon afterwards arrested two men wearing furs, spats, silk hats, and one of them

a monocle, whom the poor fellow identified as the man who hired him to carry the swag. Even more numerous are pickpockets, who preferably' ply tlrir dishonorable craft before the show windows, where they always find crowds gathering admiring that which they cannot buy. Perhaps dealers in high-class radies’ wear, fashionable costumes, millinery, and furs have least complaint. Their manikins are always busy displaying the most wonderful, or at least costly, creations “Made in Berlin,” and what is more, their creations bring prices never paid for the Parisian article. It is a puzzle where this gorgeous finery is worn, for Berliners, men and women alike, foreigners see in the streets look very shabby now in their three, four, or five year -old winter coats. Tailors and shoemakers, especially those selling to the average people, complain bitterly, and even those work, ing for the wealthy are not busy, because last year, when the people feared State Bankruptcy, many thought it wise to invest their superfluous cash in clothes sufficient for years. Perhaps household articles, furniture, and linens are most widely ’bought by the masses at the large department stores, simply because through the deferred replenishment it has become imperative. The German toy market, once the choicest, can boast few novelties, toy manufacturers complaining their best artieles.are not saleable in Germany at present