The Washington herald., 1916-06-18
TEUTON FRIVOLITY
ROUSES CRITICISM
Munich Police Head Asserts
Women Are Endangering
Success in War.
'peciL Cable to The washinston Herald.

,bSNiA SAue 70 1no Washington n1aios
London. June 17.-Much attention is
being directed In the German press to
The Golden Words of the Police Presi-
dent of Munich" 1t will be remembered
that it was In the Bavarian capital that
the police arrested a woman for appear
ing on the street in a costume which
they regarded as cxtravagant and not in
harmony with the seriousness of the
times. 1t was said th6 the woman was
liberated after she had consented to wipe
the powder off her face and to don more
sober apparel.
The police president Baron Won Grund-
herr. is anxious to breathe a new spirit
into The somewhat frivolous citizens. and
convened recently a public meeting at
which he recounted the shortcomings and
sins of the Fatherland. The following de-
tails OF the meeting are given by the
Daily Chronicle:
A vast crowd assembled to hear the
baron. He began by reminding his au-
dience that the side would win the war
which showed the greatest tenacity,
which owned the clearest conscience and
cultivated the highest ideals. They were
asked to remember that the home life Of
thhe people reacts with tremendous power
on the troops at the front, and that II
this life IL not worthy and dignihed in
every sense of the term the effect on the
army will be ruinous.
rs life in Munich" he asked, the life
that will help Us to VIM" He quoted a
soldier on leave. who said to him, II can
not stop any longer in Munich. l cannot
stand this dissipation in view of all that
we are suffering at the front.
Soldiers at the front die willingly for
German simplicity and temperance, for
German modesty and idealism, but they
do not die willingly for usurers and pleas
ure seekers, for selfish superficial men
and vain, coquettsh women"
soldiers' Wives Suffering.
The police baron went on to speak
afternoon dressed up women. girls and
young children sat in pafrs with i'm
moral men, drinking and eating the
best. At the other end of the city
from 1000 to 5000 soldiers wives
daily and nightly. sometimes all
through the night. assembled and
waited weary hours for a bit OF meat
or butter at prices which were intol-
eraole Patient, never grumbling.
waiting six and eight hours, in all
weathers, insufficiently clothed. they
stood until their turn came. There is
always a remnant of from 400 to 500
who get nothing, but they turn home
unmurmuringly.
The police president said there were
rich families for whom the war did
not seem to exist: rich dissoIutes,
thinking OF nothing but their sport
and pleasure. Why cannot they be
taken to the trenches? He referred
to the bars and wine shops with
Mattresses. where the widest orgies
were carried on. This extravasance,
he says, cries to heaven. He referred
to the food usurers as a shameless
crowd of vampires
Outside Munich it is the same. Up
in the Bavarian highlands he saw
fashionable women whose dresses
were an abomination. It is so bad
that on the door of a certain church
he saw the notice: Entrance to the
church is only permitted to those
who are not disreputably clad-that t
is to say, whose dresses are neither
too wide nor too short"
There are crowds of Bavarians who
still drink their eight and ten quarts
of beer day, and grudge a mode st
pint to the worker.
'FemaIe Apaches" Assafled.
At the close of his Grafton Baron
Grundhcrr returned to the question of
women's dress. Those women" he said,
whom one sees every afternoon faunt-
ing their flnery in our streets are not
worthy to be called German women
The name is too good, too honorable, for
them. They are female spaches who are