The Mellette County pioneer. [volume] (Wood, Mellette County, S.D.) 19??-1971, 1918-08-16
Conserve Food and Buy Liberty
Bonds-Two Ways They
Can Help.
WOMEN OF AMERICA, MAKEUP!
Pour All Your Savings Into Uncle
Sans Lap--keep on Saving and
Pouring Until the World
Is Free.
BY INEZ HAYNES IRWIN.

by tNG[ FIArNE8 IRWIN.
What can the women OF America
do TO help win this war? Two things
are certain; one that they can do a
great deal and another that, unless
the war lasts ten years longer, they
can never do Sc much as the French,
English and Italian women have done,
they can nevRs' suffer SO much as the
French, English and Italian women
have suffered.
To me, returning to America after
two years In the war countries, the un-
touched gdyety Of the American people
came as terrific shock. had left
world as black and silent as night; q
world In which had seen no dancing,
q world In which had heard no spon-
taneous laughter or-except In the case
OF military bands-no music. At first
the atmosphere Of America was almost
unbearable. was obsessed with the
desire to get back to the allied coun-
tries, to suffer with them, rather than
enjoy the comparative comfort Of a
comparatively unaroused America.
The luxury everywhere appalled, me.
Those hundreds Of motors gliding
through our streets for instance!
Private motors have long ago disap-
peared from allied Europe. The beau
tiful fabrics, the furs and laces, the
gorgeous sport clothes and the dazzling
evening dresses which still distinguish
the women Of America.
Ban on Evening Clothes.
The first time / was invited to
dinner party on my return, wore q
iong-sleeved high-necked gray-and-
black gown and found myself a wren
among birds Of paradise. No woman
OF France would think of,,wearing eve-
ming clothes. Indeed, 10th men and
women are prohibited by law from ap-
pearing in evening clothes at the thea
ter. On the few social occasions In
which they take part. French women
are dressed In black gowns with q lit
tle lace at the neck and sleeves. Eng
iish women still wear evening clothes.
When their men return on their rare
leave from the front, they cover their
aching hearts with as much gayety as
possible In order to send them back to
the filth and the vermin and the rats
and the damp and the cold and the
wounds and the constant sight of death
psychologically refreshed. But most of
the evening dresses that the English
women are now wearing date back to
the beginning Of the war. And strang-
est Of all, perhaps, for country at
war, those lustrous streets with their
rows Of electric lights and their vivid.
dashing, changing. iridescent electric
signs. In Paris, you plunge into a
deep twilight when you leave your res
taurant, and In London you grope your
way home through dangerous Sty-
dan gloom. Then the careless spend
ing In American hotels and restau-
rants. In Paris those places close at
half-past nine. And food! Food con-
ditions have never been SO bad In
France az In the other allied coun-
tries, for France has always fed her
self and Is, moreover. the worlds best
cook. But In Italy and England, meat
Is a rare luxury to be obtained only
once In q great while: butter and
sugar are long-forgotteh dreams.
See Their Homes Destroyed.
And then In the case of France and
10 some degree Of Italy, the allied
women have seen vast stretches Of
carefully cared-for ancient forest and
enormous sections of softly-beautifu'
farming country turned into metal-7id-
den dumps; they have seen dozens of
bmall cities and hundreds Of little vii
lages transformed to ash heaps; they
have seen 80 much old sacred beauty
IN the form Of churches, cathedrals
and historic monuments reduced to
Hills of rubble that the whole world
must. seem desert to them. They
have even had to endure the extra
affront Of an exhibition In Berlin Of
the art treasures looted from northern
France.
The allied women have nursed the
wounded. the tubercular. the under.
inourished; they have taught new
trades to the crippled and blind and
those who are invalided for life. They
have taken care Of thousands and
thousands Of refugees from Belgium
northern France and Siberia. They
have had to provide for the bringing
np of thousands OF orphan children,
This has not come upon them gradual.
". but an the time and In increasing
Proportions.
But, after al, these things are a.
nothing to the death Of the flower ot
fheir male youth. England and France
and Itnly have lost % much In man
a,ower that no member Of our genera
don looks for happiness again during
.6ls own lifetime! They hope only
for' one thing-to insure the freedom
ek the next generation. I.
sens An Gone.
Y husband a y ParIsian. said
= beautiful Americas woman married