The Washington herald., 1917-09-08
THE FLAG in THE KITCHEN
BY. MRS. III. b. GoLDRIGk

The kitchen is so homely and an
cient an institution that like all IA
miTiar necessities it has come to be
more or less despised in comparison
to parlor and other frou frou graces.
II it has not been considered an
artistic profession neither has it been
deemed heroic. The frying pan is
not an alluring implement, even in
times of peace, and in the hour of
war. when all patriots long to do
something for their country's sake,
how much more valiant to tote a
gun or toot a bugle than wash dishes
three times a day. 1t is more thrill
ing far to keep step to the tune of
brass band than the kissing sput-
ter of a boiling pot. and besides,
the cook receives not even an iron
cross for deeds OF daring. When I
think OF the desolated homes of
Flanders and the lonely mounds in
France, hesitate to have st. Peter
write down in black and white that
all did for my fellows was to bake
loaves for the hungry and brew tea
for those who thirst. And yet why
should l be ashamed of my calling?
am one Of a vast oommissariat who
brew and bake the world around.
The kitchen is our firing line, hun
ger and defeat are our enemies,
strength and success our victories. 1t
is an enormous army this commits
slriat caters to. When you think
Of 1t. there is a wonderful number
of mouths in the world. Some of
them can sing. most of them speak,
but all can and must eat, or the
world go glimmering. Babies die
without milk. soldiers lose battles
without beef. Young. old and mid
dle-aged, all are as dependent as in
fants upon their daily bread.
When l was young and believed /
could live on the emotions of my
soul, / used to wonder that the need
Of eating was remembered in the
Lords Prayer. That petition has
doubtless been spoken as heedlessly
by millions Of others until the year
1915 when the worlds crops fell short
and the wealthiest nation on earth
realized with a shock what II might
mean to so hungry. Joseph dealing
out measures of grain to his starving
brothers, India in the throes of
famine, even o. neighbor. Cuba, beg
sing for bread have seemed more or
less horrors of the imagination until
the reality Of serious wheat shortage
right here at home has come to pass
and the actually of scarcely a potato
in all our bins has been seen with our
own eyes.
To be custodian of the family larder
begins to take on new proportions and
shows itself to be no mean job. To
buy and apportion food and to prop
erly cook it is no longer a petty task
to be done and got through with as
soon as possible, but a real business
which demands earnest thought and
painstaking care. Heretofore, kitchen
work. on account of its prosaic char
acter. has been done more or less per-
functorily. the sole guiding purpose
OF the cooks endeavors being her
family's welfare. That was a good
and sufficient reason once upon a time.
But war has razed all barriers. Even
the kitchen walls have fallen. To-
day. the housewife. looking from her
special precinct, views the table of
the world, instead OF only her own.
Her own CHILDREN must not want, GER
tainly, but neither must her country's
soldiers, who guard its gates.
There must be a full loaf for her
own board, but what about the empty
plates in Belgium, the vanishing sup
plies in England, the shorter rations
in France. and next winters stores in
our own United States? A far cry, all
this, from your kitchen and mine
Not at all. II all the spoonfuls wasted
in America were conserved, the
chance OF a universal pinch of hunger
would be greatly minimized. We have
Joined the nations in a death grapple.
Every housewife from Maine to Cali
fornia, from the Dakotas to Texas, will
help win the struggle or lose It. What
you or I alone might save would not
turn the tide, but what we altogether
save would. Solidarity should be our
watchword and sufficient food for our