The Waterbury Democrat., 1934-03-02
Bx RATPH HEINZEN

Limited Press Stan Correspondent) ]
 Paris, TUP)-"The CoIonel's lady and Judy O,Grady are sisters under the sIsin',-they are probably both doing a spot of spying.
 Footloose and carefree, enough money in their purses to carry them wherever smart crowds al- ways go, an army of women spies swarms over Europe. Living by their wits, these women are In constant battle with the secret po- lice of a dozen nations. They are considered vastly more dangerous than male spies, for there is no card-catnlog of these painted beauties as exists for men identi- fled with the industry.
 From Mayfair to Marrakeesh there are modern. Matt Harris. They may be society favorites, rubbing ! elbows at fashionable dinners with foreign office or em- bassy attaches, junior officers of land and sea, or business barons. They may be bobbed-hair denf- zens of waterfront dives, who are not averse to trading their qcrusty favors for q bit of naval knowl- edge.
 < These battalions of mysterious women have little or no official status. Some of them spy as a profession; others spy because it makes their blood jingle and they get a sensation out of their battles of wits with the worlds greatest counter-espionage organizations.
 Women Usually Assistants z They are generally intermerdi- aries between male spies, or they go out on definite assignment to find some specific bit of informa- ton, and find rare sport in draw ing the knowledge from their vic- tirns.
 Alleged chief of the recently
 broken International Spy Syndi- cate, which French police crushed after months of trailing, was a woman, and an excellently edu- cated woman at that, Lydia Stahl. An admitted artistic painter on silk, inventor of new system of Swedish exercises, writer of cfri- lerna scenarios, a graduate chem ist, a mathematician, she was preparing for a degree in Chinese language and history when she was arrested.
 ?. An American girl, just out of vassar, Mrs Marjory Talley Switz, was caught up in the swirl of the affair and is still being held by French police. who are trying to determine just what role, if any, she played in the international
 "La Belle Sophie" was bar maid along the German frontier in Alsace; she drew beer for the workers who poured cement for the French border fortiflcations. She knew every secret which was whispered by the workers. She knew, also, where she could sell the information.
 She did sell it, and made enough to quit her job behind the bar; French counter-spies were suspi- cious of her new-found prosperity and trailed her. When she started across the border by car they caught her and found a new model of a French army automatic gun concealed beneath her skirts. Sophie Drozdt has been in jail for months and her name is never mentioned in print; police say the case is not closed.
 She Didn't. Know
 Lydia Auspinska was a member of an aristocratic Polish family. She had a weakness for baccarat .,nd played too long at the Zappat Casino one night. Down to her last penny, she accepted tempo rary financial help from distin- guished looking gentleman at her elbow, who offered it. To pay it back, she agreed to carry a pack age to another European capital. When Lydia found out that she was playing the role of carrier pigeon for an International spy band. she went back to zappat, risked her fortune, won thou sands of dollars, paid back her loan, and committed suicide.
 These women were front-page headliners in recent months. Dur ing the World war, there were thousands of women in the dan gerous spy game on both sides of the lines. Mati-Hari is more than g dead spy; she is g symbol of a half million women spies, of whom many hundreds paid the supreme sacrifice.
 Mati-Hari was shot at dawn in