A LITTLE EDEN

Taranaki Daily News, 17 June 1933, Page 20 (Supplement)

A LITTLE EDEN

900 GERMANS WHO LIVE IN IT. PLEASURE IN POVERTY. ' Always, from the ancient hermits downward, there have, been people who have tried, singly or in communities, to live a better life than the bulk of mankind has managed to dp, says the Hungarian correspondent of the Children’s Newspaper. Individuals have, on the whole, succeeded better and more enduringly than communities; but there is’ one community in Gennany which was started forty years ago and is still going strong. We hope it is comfortable in these tragic times for that country. A sort of garden city, but unlike any other garden city we have seen, it is. some miles north of Berlin and has been given the appropriate name of Eden. It was founded in 1893 by a. handful of vegetarians with the object of. ensuring for themselves as, well as for their offspring a healthy, frugal, and economical open-air life. , . SOMETHING TO BE STRIVEN FOR. But. if you set your feet on an upward path the probabilities are that you will find yourself on the heights before you know it. • And the ■ little colony • so modestly ■■ started has not only grown ,in the course of the years, but has realised in its growth loftier ideals than its founders perhaps dreamed of. The old ideal of a healthy mind in a healthy body; which modem city life has somewhat dimmed, has been made bright again arid set up as a thing to be striven for. Siipplicity, frugality, the love of work for its own sake, the untrammelled enjoyment of sunshine arid air arid'water—all these have been made a part of life'as it is lived in'Eden. Among the nine hundred members of the |ittle colony are men and’ women of all classes and professions. All are complete or partial vegetarians, all teetotallers and non-smokers; all have abandoned fashion, luxury, fine clothes, arid ostentation of every kind, and all have learned the enjoyment of simple pleasures'. A SPLENDID BILL OF HEALTH. -There ; are in Eden no wine shops, no tobacconist’s shops! no butchers, and no picture theatres. A recent inquiry has revealed that three-fifths of the children born in-the place did not know what a tipsy person looked like, and that none had ever heard an oath or a bad word. In forty years there has not been a single case for the Law Courts, nor has any child had s to. be sent to a reformatory. There is a good school, and- the children ’’’ run "■ about -free and - happy and scantily clad, and bursting, with health and spirits. Among th® 330 children who have , passed through the school in the last 25 years there has not been a single, case of death, while of the -babies born up till 1923 only.’six have died, toe lowest percentage any civilised country can show.'.- ■ ' . . ■” ’ ’ ■ i AN OASIS IN THE DESERT. Life in Eden is-extremely cheap, and urierhployment unknown. Ip this.respect toe place, is “an oasis in the desert of economic life,” as a member of toe colony puts it. . ■ . ■/, • To make this state of affairs possible, all workers voluntarily consented last year to a .20 per cent: reduction 6f their wages. Why not, seeing -that they could do so and yet suffer no want? In the bad days of inflation after the war a friend in Denmark sent a hundred Danish crowns as a present.for the poor children of Eden. He received in reply a letter of thanks, but was told, that some embarrassment had been felt as to how this “enormous- sum” was to be spent,' there being, properly speaking, no poor children in Eden.. “We are all poor,” wrote his correspondent, “but we take pleasure in our poverty.” This is 'the key to the secret of the place. These modem Eden-dwellers have rediscovered the old . truth that happiness does not depend on riches. They are no Communists; the little that each man owns is his own, to do as he likes with; but as he knows that toe best things in life are not to be bought with money the pursuit of it has ceased to interest him. BETTER THAN KILLING. MEN CO-OPERATING. WITH SEALS. In the immense estuary' of the: St. Lawrence River the Canadians have, a proverb that- there is good in every ill, and so it seems... The fishermen there are no longer trying ■ to. exterminate their, formidable competitors the seals in their ■ search for fish, , but are watching the exact - places to which .toe seals go, foliowirig them up; and they find by .toejr movements a sure indication, where toe fish may be found. •It is a safe ..rule -that if there are no seals there are no fish. Up to now the seal has been, looked upon as ah .arch-enemy'.of toe fishermen because of the immense quantities of fish it destroys.- • ’• - ' . • ■ “V At the time when the salmon is seeking the rivers' around the shores, whether Canadian, or British, to ascend to its breeding-grounds, ■ there the seals- turn up, - and declare ■to the men on the lookout where they, may look for salmon. On toe Atlantic shores of . North America the seals show.where are to be foujid/toe beds of oysters and toe choicest rockIpbsters.. ’ - Aeroplanes are used to locate which move about jin. shoals;-but. they have limits, owing to water, depth, and also they cost too much, except for fishing on a grand scale.. Here the seals come in. . . It is a happy idea—co-operation ' instead of extermination. ■ GIVING-IT A NEW FOUNDATION. FOLDING UP THE LEANING TOWER. The Leaning Tower of Pisa must lean no farther.. This .ancient tower; nearly 180 feet high, is more than 16 feet, out of the straight.-' The tower is built on clay, arid a survey has shown that pockets of water have formed round its base - as it lias sunk, and that the water is weakening toe subsoil. So the tower is being- provided with- a firm, foundation that wjl| prevent more sinking* The present foundation consists of a great ring wall. This is being strengthened with cement, .'the tower meanwhile being supported' on its shorter side by great posts.' When this is finished the ground for some depth beneath the foundation and round about toe tower is to be drained, and. wherever necessary cement wjii be injected at high pressure. By next winter it is hoped’ that the man-made rock on which the Leaping Tower will then stand will be firm enough to -give it many more centuries of life. A SCARLET BEAUTY. Among entries from France, Germany, and Holland for the Delphinium Exhibition, to be held, this season in Cheshire, is a bright scarlet flower raised from seed by a Dutch grower. . California is sending a fine display white and cream ones, which will arrive here in cold storage and be forced into bloom in time for toe show.