VILLAGES WITHOUT MATCHES

Evening Star, Issue 18138, 30 November 1922, Page 12

VILLAGES WITHOUT MATCHES

■ PRIMITIVE METHODS OF FIRE- ! MAKING IN RUSSIA. The old'-fashioned device of borrowing fire fa being resorted 1 to in many villages in tiro Tartar Republic of Kazan, according to reports reaching tho London office of the American Relief Administration. For over a year no matches have been procurable in those parts. They are to be had' only in the cities, and even .if tho peasants had money with which to buy them they ere not for sale. Their fuel supply fa'low. too, and they cannot afford to keep the fire continually going, so they have bit on the device of taking turns. One house a night keeps its fire alight, and the other villagers flurry out to get their morning ember, as they might do for a morning paper in another place. Tho question- of fuel supply for win teals becoming acute. in many places, particularly in South Russia. An -MR. A. official, returning recently from Odessa, describes tire condition in one children's homo ho visited. No wood had been procurable for a long time, so flooring ■had) to bo removed In an unoccupied room for tho purpose of cooking the -steals. This region is absolutely treeless, end usually gets its supply from tho wooded sections m North Russia; but since tbo breakdown of tho country's transport and regular economic life none lias been imported. Every empty building, therefore, has been stripped of its woodwork, with tho result that the stone and brick walls -have collapsed,