Vilas County news. [volume] (Eagle River, Vilas County, Wis.) 1896-1927, 1916-02-09
LONG BUTTER LINES
Picturesque Scenes Witnessed in
Berlin Today.
People Resort to All Manner of Tricks
to Get Extra Supply of Butter
Working Glasses Get 1t, Well
to-Do Go Without.

The Hague.-Picturesque and some
what pitiful scenes where long lines
wait at the doors of German butter
shops are described in a dispatch 10
the New Rotterdam Courant from it's
Berlin correspondent.
AS this newspaper is sympathetic
with Germany, it cannot be accused
of presenting an eXcitable and exag-
gerated account such as the Germans
complain of in allied journals.
The correspondent begins by quot
ing from a story told him by a friend
Il got in with little persuasion.
A line was waiting. They would not
let me go in front, of course, but
pretended l only wanted vegetables.
So l got through the line and after
securing vegetables, l asked with a
very innocent face for quarter of
pound of butter. l hid it in my coat,
went out and joined at the end of the
line. Without much more trouble
got second quarter of a pound"
The correspondent comments:
today; that is what we must do to
capture little fat or little butter.
Only with cunning or patience can we
butter our bread. In long straight
lines the people stand for hours before
the butter shops. Some get nothing,
some welter in butter. He who has
no need of butter goes out on the hunt
for it, as for sport. Housewives tell
with pleasure and pride how much
butter they have captured. /, myself,
with my family had to go without but.
ter for days till l tumbled on a Gun.
ming ruse whereby I secured a pound.
And how | Dragged about it!
Many butter and cheese shops are
closed practically the whole day. A
paper in the window announces when
the sale will begin and long before
the specified time crowd collects
mostly mothers and children. Some
little ones are there to capture a quar-
ter of pound on their own hook. Did
the salesman know there were several
from one house they would get moth
ing, so they cheerfully ignore each
other during the long wait.
"a policemen keeps order in the
waiting lines. In the good, old days
such lines collected to buy tickets for
a Caruso concert; now butter or some
other necessity is all we think of.
1.-THE cause of this singular situa.
tion is not far to seek. In peace time,
to say nothing of war time, Germany
does not produce enough butter for
home consumption. Lack of fodder
and speculation combined to drive up
prices. A scarcity of fat accompanied
the scarcity of butter To do without
these two would be a disaster for the
German working people, so the gov
eminent took the matter up, and, as
butter, like fat, is free from pluto
cratic influences, the government de.
cided the butter should be fairly di,
vided, and fixed low maximum prices
accordingly.
The result is that the working
classes get butter and the weIl-to-do
go without. The working mans wife
goes herself or sends her children to
stand for hours in line. She has the
whip-hand, now that patience and not
money is the determining factor.
"The social side of this regulation
has thus reached it's goal, but not so
the financial. The prices are so low
that imports from Denmark and Hol.
land are almost out of the question
and the government is now faced with
the dilemma; plenty of butter at panic
prices or little butter at low prices.
In official circles it is hoped that
the situation will soon be easier.
They hope soon to get the benefit of
big potato harvest, the increase in
the farm stocks, and the imported food
from the Balkans. But how to deal
with the disagreeable fact that the fix.
ing of maximum prices automatically
diminishes the supply available still
remains an unsolved problem