"ALIEN'S" LETTER FROM ENGLAND.

Otago Witness, Issue 3275, 20 December 1916, Page 56

"ALIEN'S" LETTER FROM ENGLAND.

(Specially Written for the Ladies' Page). "OUR DAY" AND OTHER DAYS. October 23. We have had a week of bitterly cold weather all over England, and on this coast icy blasts blowing from the North Sea turn one's thoughts outward to where our navy are holding the seas for us in their lonely, patient watch. "Our Day," Thursday, October 19, when all the English-speaking Empire was called upon to make sacrifice for our soldiers and sailors, and to give to the Red Cross more lavishly than it has ever given before, was a clay of unflagging effort in England. Last year " Our Day "* was productive of over £1,000,000 by tens of thousands, and this year the proceeds must greatly exceed those of last. In London alone 15,000 sellers of flags were in the streets. From half-past 7 m the morning till the streets were nearly dark indefatigable ladies did their best to exchange the toy Union Jack for coin of the realm. A number of Anzacs in London on leave assisted in the sales. Besides the flag sales (4,000,000 from Id to 2s 6d each) were 500,000 of strips of the Cufi'ley airship wire, which promises to realise its weight in gold beyond the triumph of the air. At various shops and stalls and in the West End restaurants airship rings, brooches, tiepins and bracelets, wire inkstands and photograph frames, were sold from £1 la to £5 ss. _ At the Stock Exchange and Baltic a brisk bidding sent up the prices. Thousands oi folk of all classes were anxious to possess a German souvenir of our home battles, and the Cuffley Zeppelin was not only a triumph when brought down in flames, but has proved *v gold mine for the Red Cross. The stalls, where many charming and useful things were sold, were situated in most of the leading hotels, restaurants, including the Savoy, Carlton, Riiz, Claridge's, Berkley, and the Australasian section at the Cecil. The Grosvenor, Alexandra, Hyde Parle, Cadogan, Regent's Palace, Romano's,

Monico, Criterion, Princes', Popular, Frascarti's also had stalls, and among a number of the leading drapery stores were Liberty's, Evans's, Harrod's, Derry and Toms's, Green and Edwards's, and others. London presented a bustling and a prosperous face : but for the khaki and the hospital blue, the nurses and uniformed women, it would not be known that we are at war. But the bustle and earnestness and activity was because of the war. Everybody—every woman, I should say, of note; —seemed to be doing something. On Trafalgar Day the signs of animation were on every hand. The restaurants and theatres were crowded, and thousands paid their tribute to Nelson's monument, which, with the lions in Trafalgar square, were decorated. It was a brief anticipation of that other victory of which everyone is assured. But even the most optimistic have left off prophesying a speedy victory. It is realised that our one great chance of bringing matters to a climax was missed by playing at a blockade. Among the many munificent donations to " Our Day " were those headed by our Royal Family, the King leading oft with £SOOO, tho Queen with £IOOO, the Prince of Wales with £IOOO, and Queen Alexandra with £SCO. Numerous handsome presents were given to the ladies selling at the stalls and shops. Mrs M'Kenna, who was : .n charge of the St. James's street stall, had, besides the airship relics, a large quantity of fruit, and during the day she was presented with £IOO9. For Thursday and Fridav the donations amounted to £101,894 i3s. A notable donation from the Sudan was £B4OO from the British, Egyptian, Sudanese, military, and civil communities in the Sudan. A piece of the outer envelope of the supev-Zeppelin brought down at Potter's Bar, and which did not measure more than 2in, was sold n T ne times over, and realised £llO6. .. The reappearance of Miss Mary Anderson in " Pygmalion and Galatea " was one of the social events of last week, the occasion being in aid of the Princess Club Hospital. Queen vVlexandra made one of a delighted audience which packed His Majesty's Theatre. Miss Anderson was as wonderful as in the olden time in her famous presentation of the Greek statuo coming to life. Her Galatea was a miracle of art, the cold statue being transformed to flesh and blood before the eyes of the fascinated audience. In the afterpiece, " Comedy and Tragedy," which Sir W. S. Gilbert wrote specially for Miss Anderson, she was- very brilliant. Old theatregoers found all the old charm in the two famous parts, and Miss Anderson was recalled again and again. There is a prospect of a hard winter ahead for people of moderate means. A Board of Trade statement, issued last week, says that the cost of living, striking an average, has increased by 45 to 50 per cent, since July, 1914. This means that £1 is now worth only 13s 4d. Food, rent, clothing fuel, and light are all increasing, and the purchasing power of a sovereign spent on food goes no further than 12s before the war. Eggs are double the price of July, 1914, meat is dearer, fish is twice the price, flour is more than double the price, bread is more than half as much again, sugar is 3£d a lb more, potatoes are half as much again, butter is half as much again, cheese is half as much again, bacon is half as much again, and milk is nearly half as much again. I paid BAd for a packet cf matches the other day. and the oil for my writinglamp, for which I once paid 8d a gallon, is now Is 6d. Writing material-, everything you can mention, soap, starch, all the innumerable little oddments for household use, the hundred and one small necessaries outside the actual food and clothes and fuel, leave but a pitiful margin for the poor. The sugar scandal is disgraceful, and among many of the grocers only lib of granulated sugar is allowed with, a 5s order 21b with a 10s, and so on. In very many families there is not a margin of 5s a week to spend on groceries, and sugar is therefore refused. And sugar, tea, and margarine are the chief .items on many grocery lists, from which many other thinn-s' have been out off. Without sugar there seem to be few palatable things left to the poor. Cocoa and tea are unpalatable to most people without sweetening matter; puddings, especially fruit puddings, impossible. It seems to come next to salt as a necessity in cooking. There arc. a few honest grocers who shim the system, and decline to be parties to the extortion. The milk scandal still exists, different parts of the country making different charges, 6d a quart being the general price demanded, although other milk vendors can supply it at 4d. Without their milk and their sugar the children of the poor will suffer, for shortage of sugar means shortage of jam. A lot of the fruit has been wasted this season because the sugar to preserve it was refused. And jam is 10jd and Is a lb. With their bacon and meat cut off and fish a luxury it is a distracting problem for many poor women to know what to give their children. The suggestion of one meatless day a week, so to reduce the demand upon meat, brought forth some sarcastic remarks from some quarters. " One meatless day ! Why, we already have six meatless days!" said one woman.

The demand for women's work has saved the country what would have been a terrible problem during the -war. No young and fit woman need be unemployed ; and thev are earning more money, and spending more, than ever has been known in the history of England. On the other hand, to balance matters, or partly balance matters, the man's wage is no longer forthcoming beyond his pay as a soldier, and the allowance to the wife and children. The problem of the women in the man's job, and her relinquishment of it or not on the io-mi's return, is already causing anxiety ir. aome quarters, which is crossing the brMge before it is reached. The thing that matters most at the present moment is the need for the woman's labour in the man's place and her willingness and ability to fill the vacant posts. Over three-quarters of a million women

' have qualified and directly replaced men in the industries since the war began, and 100,000 additional women are engaged, making, it is estimated, altogether about 3,250,C00 workers in the main occupations of the United Kingdom. But in a year's time these figures will have enormously increased. For every man that is ''combed out" of the industries and sent into the army a woman will probably be installed, and there is a great call for women on the land. Their work will be imperative before next spring. "The whole question of labour after the war is going to be a serious one," says Mrs Despard, "and the women who have taken men's positions do not provide the most serious phase of it." Discussing the question whether there should be an Act of Parliament passed compelling employers to reinstate men in the positions they held before the war, Mrs Despard thinks, with many others, that it will be unnecessary, for a great number will never want to return to their old job:;. Once out of the rut they will refuse the'old grove, and many, it is feared, will emigrate. If they emigrate to the younger parts of the Empire the Empire will not Idee them; but if they are allowed to leave the British Empire for lack of inducements some other country will be the richer. Then, alas! many of the men will never return from the war, and many of those who clo return will be incapacitated. In flic great economic upheaval that has taken place, and the great industrial changes that will still further disorganise the old conditions of labour before the war comes to a close, it is impossible to forecast with assurance what will transpire, much less to make hard and fast rules. The women must have provision—that is certain, —and in hundreds of thousands of cases that provision will have to be made by themselves. In tens of thousands of cases the war workers are young married women, who will gladly return to the home life should their husbands return. There are comparatively few who, with clearheaded calmness, can calculate and arrange their future for after the war. iThe pitting of gains against the losses, and feeling proportionately is beyond a suffering soul. There is no sense of proportion to suffering. Calculation will come later. All the world is buried 01 resurrected in a hope lost or regained, to those who hope with life's hope, or fear with their hearts; and two-thirds of these war-working women entered upon the course of their labour without a question of what was to be their portion when their *work is no longer needed. Many of them expected to marry their boy when he came back. And as these terrible days lengthen into months and years, and the end not in sight, it is impossible to calculate to a nicety what we are out to lose or to gain, and present a correct balance sheet. There is far to go, much to do, much still to renounce before we can balance up. The individual gain and the glory of conquest has already gone from the life of many a woman of the Empire. The war shrines are being unveiled not in ones and twos, but all over the country. The meanest slum lias its list of heroes; the poorest help to keep the shrines sweet with flowers. And here the mourners come and are comforted by some human or divine emotion that lifts the heart to dwell for a brief moment on holy and heroic thing*. Side by side you may see mourners of widely-different classes praying for the living, perhaps for the dead, unconscious of the traffic of the< streets. I was reading an interesting article the other day in the Daily Mail, entitled, "Shrines and Miracles," in which it suggested that the soldier is coming home a more religious man than when he wont away. Among the first impressions when the soldier reaches France is the religion of the French nation visualised before him. As his troopship goes slowly up tho river to Rouen, French priests come down ro the water's edge and bless the men as they pass. Al] around him in France are the wayside shrines at which the people pray; women and children and wounded have gone to the shrines for sanctuary, and marvellous stories are told of their protection. "It is the men in the fields of France who have sent the religion into the streets of London," says this writer. In their half-shy way on the return they have suggested that "it would not be half bad to see a shrine hereabouts." They show treasured talismans and mascots, a little cross that a sister has given them in a French hospital; and many have received the spiritual ministrations of the padres before going into action. Face to face with death, Protestant and Nonconformist has looked past his creed into the Infinite. A lady superintendent, addressing the girls and women in a munition factory the other day, said: "The men are learning very much while they are soldiering. They win' come back expecting great things of you. You can't go on in the old way." See that you don't disappoint them.