The New York herald., 1922-07-09
|VIENNA'SBRIGHTNESS
| AMAZES AMERICANS
Expecting to Find Misery,
They See People Well
Clothed and Fed.
LABOR rs WE'LL PAID
Earning 10000 Crowns a
Day Equalizes Prices of
Goods in Paper.
ONLY GOVERNMENT POOR
Cannot Cut Grass in Parks
4 and Forced to Close
Subway.
ONLY GOVERNMENT POOR

they find here Expecting to see a
half starved population and misery
walking the streets, they find in the
aggregate a people here looking as
well fed as any in the German cities,
certainly as well clothed, including
even the school children, and with
faces much brighter than one passes
on the streets of Berlin.
Perhaps it is the difference between
the Viennese and the German tenn
permanent that accounts for this At
any rate, this city to the tourist is not
the city of awful tragedy it has been
painted Behind the fast fading fa-
cades of some Of its splendid homes
there may be tragedies. One hears Of
high born families living on the mer-
est pittance. But driving from the
station to ones hotel and roaming
about the streets at random one won
ders and doubts If all the stories of
starvation are true.
Berlin and the German cities have
drab detected appearance compared with
Vienna, proving that the happiness and
condition of people is not entirely to
be measured by how many thousands
of paper crowns 1t takes to make dol
lar If the working population gets as
daily wage as many thousands OF these
crowns as Is necessary to meet the price
of living the financial problem seems to
become not theirs but the Governments.
This seems to be the situation in Vienna.
Cafes Are Thronged.
Take the middle class cafes or even
those in the poorer quarters. They are
thronged nightly by people enjoying
themselves-young men and girls pay
ing with equanimity two hundred and
three hundred kronen for big beautiful
beers. In the restaurants one sees clerks
from the stores buy lunches for thou
sand crowns or more. which seems a lot
in Austrian money. but is only about 10
cents. The NEW YORK HERALD corre-
spondent walked many streets and did
not pass a school child without shoes
and stockings or with famished ap-
pearance. This may be due partially to
the relief work done here by many
organizations, but on the other hand 1t
Is also explained by the general econ
omic condition that exists here. under
which labor is earning $4,000 and 10000
paper crowns a day. which up till now
has been sufficient to pay the paper
prices.
Unlike Germany and especially Berlin.
the working class of Austria control
the situation here far better han their
German brethren. From the beginning
of the republic they have pushed up
their paper wages right along with the
prices, or In other words kept their
wages corresponding to the steady
drop In the value of the money. Until
crash comes, il 1t comes at all, and
they decide that the kronen Is utterly
worthless in their hands whether they
get 1t by the bale or the barrel, the state
Of affairs will continue In which the
working class, including clerks and
shopgirls. find themselves certainly not
in a state Of misery. 1t Is only the
Government itself which evidences the
real state of Austria as a state trying
to keep afioat on blown up financial
bubble which may burst at any moment.
If 1t should burst, then the working
class may feel 1t and trouble come then.
That is what is feared.
But Government Is Poor.
The Government is too poor even to
keep the grass cut in the beautiful i'm
perial parks now thrown open to the
public, formerly the private strolling
places of archdukes. The beautiful
gardens of the Emperor. now open,
like the Tuileries. are a sad sight. The
city Is even too poor to run the SUBJ
way, which Is closed up. 1t Is too
por to keep the wonderful museums
thanking the great imperial palace open
more than a few hours three days a
week.
For the American and other tourists,
however. Vienna seems merely like a
cheaper edition of Paris-this means
that 1t Is more interesting, more beauti-
full than any big capital in Europe out
side Of Paris and SO cheap to live in
that 1t makes the visitor gasp. Good
rooms can still be obtained in the best
hotels from $3.50 TO 50 day, and the
Viennese show no inclination in either
restaurants or hotels to discriminate
against travellers coming with dollars or
pounds. The wonderful opera house
nightly draws almost every tourist in
the city, for good seats are obtainable
as low as 25 cents.
Restaurants Are Cheap.
Along tho Ringstrasse there are won
derful restaurants with music of the bet
ter kind. where Americans are regaling
themselves with excellent dinners cost
ing about so cents. At every drop Of the
crown the American visitors are letting
out their belts little bit more and stay
ing little longer. Hotel servants are
respectful and all classes generally, with
the proverbial good humor of the vien-
nese. seem to be bent. not upon gougjng.
but upon sending every tourist home
hoping he will be a good missionary for
their city and the capse Austria Is plead
ing before the world.
Takes are cheaper than anywhere
else and car fares almost nothing In
American money. Also the best of vien-
nese artists will paint your portrait for
$50, and music lessons from masters cost
but n song, for II Is this class and those
who are trying to live on the income
from rents and other securities who are
suffering.
That they are suffering terribly there
Is no doubt. An aristocratic Austrian
women living in a comfortable apart
ment because of a pre-war rent told the
correspondent that she and her mother
had IN live for \ war On nlA k~xw>~o