DANISH CONDITIONS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 106, 6 May 1936, Page 14

DANISH CONDITIONS.

TALK TO BUSINESS WOMEN.

At tho meeting of the Business Women's Round Table Club on Monday evening Mrs. Nielsen spoke to the ladies present of her native Denmark. In Copenhagen, the capital, ehe said, were many ultra-modern flats, all centrally heated, all perfectly silent. The Danes were noted as excellent cooks. Fish was a great favourite on the menu, but no housewife would dream of buying a fish that was not alive. The people bought direct from the fishing boats, which had little boats with perforated bottoms, and in these was the catch. The housewife picked out the live fish, and it was killed and cleaned while she waited. Fish was very cheap; 20 herrings would cost about fivepence or sixpence. Oysters, however, were a luxury, and were never cheaper than 2/0 a dozen. Raw lish did not pound a tempt-

ing dish to New Zealaiiders, but Mrs. Nielsen explained how it was prepared. After being cut into little pieces and left two or three duvti In oil and spices, it was served on fingers of ryebread, and made a delicious hors d'oeuvre. Haybox cooking was almost universal in Denmark. Every woman owned a haybox and made good use of it. Farming there was different from farming in New Zealand. Intensive cultivation was necessary, and the ground was too valuable to let the cattle or pigs run on it as was done here. They wore stabled and hand fed, all the food being grown on the land, and it was only in the flush of the season that for a short while they were allowed to run. Ground was even too valuable to fence; a double furrow was the only dividing line. The great majority were small holdings of

four acres or thereabouts, and it wae a really big farm that would be 50 acres. Even on the four-acro farms, and with the added cost of solid stabling to withstand the severe winter, the farmer made a comfortable living. Result of Team Work. Team work was one of- the outstanding features of life in Denmark. Cooperative societies owned all stud animals, and as every farmer had ehares

they were able to go in for pedigree stock. Tho farmers' banks let out money to farmers at small interest, and all profits went back to the farmers. A

few years ago potatoes had a very bad year. Potato flour, which was almost unknown in New Zealand, was used a great deal in Denmark, a mixture of half wheat flour and half potato flour being used in the greater part of the cooking. The banks advanced large sums for an enormous potato flour factory, and owing to the bad year lost. However, the fishing industry, which was very extensive, had a good year and helped to make up the deficiency. This was another example of team work. Still another form, continued Mrs. Nielsen, was the adult education. Groups of people of culture- and standing travelled and got all possible information on problems in farming arid business, life. They threw open their houses to form folk schools. Some were very elaborate institutions, some quite simple, and the people paid accordingly. The borough councils helped and made education within tho reach of everyone. Men went to tlie.se schools in the winter' as summer was such a busy time. Sometimes men and women went to the school for a fortnight. For instance, a woman farmer had trouble with hens laying eggs without shells. She went for a fort° night to the folk school and learnt what to do, and then was able to tell her neighbours. All the young men have to serve a term of military training called home service; some for one year, some longer, according to the corps. It is purely for home defence, as there was no etandin" army. Mrs. Nielsen said that owing to the severe winters (she had been snowed in on occasions for four days) home life was different. During the long winter evenings the home industries, such as needlework, lace making and tapestry work, were carried on. The lace, a cross between torchon and Brussels, was coming greatly into favour again. Mrs. Nielsen said that in Denmark the school age was seven years, and eight years the compuleory age. It was thought that up to seven years children should be like little animals, and just play and frolic.