Evening star., 1942-12-06
Austerity in Clothing
And Food Become
Fashion in England
Transportation Even
More Serious Problem
As Result Of War
BY H. ]. J. SARGENT,
Consolidated News Features

very much the fashion In England.
Austerity in cooking, austerity in
furniture and clothing, austerity,
above all, in travelling by rail, bus
and private car.
Food is not as short as some people
abroad seem to think, but not is
wasted. Food brings the reek of
battle into our kitchens" as Lord
Woolton, the Food Minister, re-
marked recently. Never was a truer
word said.
The British Food Ministry is one
OF the most successful departments
this war has produced. The surpris-
ingly high standard of health the
country is enjoying after three years
Of war is its finest reward.
Severe rationing of certain food
stufts. such as meat, has had an all
around good effect. 1t has been Of
flcially anpounced that the general
nutritional intake in 1912 indicates
q distinct improvement compared
with that in 1941, especially as re-
CARDS the intake of first-class pro-
TEN, which apparently has increased
substantially, mainly because of the
increased consumption of cheese and
milk. This Is a remarkable thing to
find after three years of war.
Furniture Sturdy and Simple.
Austerity in clothes does not press
the public to an intolerable degree
because to very large extent every
nody has to wear the same clothes
now, and those who are not in uni
form cannot very easily lord it over
their fellows by wearing gorgeous
raiment because the coupons will not
allow 1t.
Austerity In furniture has arrived.
and 1 confess that it does not appeal
10 me. l am perhaps overfond of
Old pieces. Hepplewhite and Chip
pendale, who gave their inspiration
TO SO much lovely furniture in the
last three or four generations, might
perhaps approve of our austere
pieces for the kitchen, but not, I
thlnk, for anything much higher.
Inc pest that can be said for this
furniture Is that it will save time in
oustlng. There are no fancy pieces
OF decoration to catch dust.
Inc tables are usually of a pull
out type, with tops of veneered ply-
wood. and the legs are of the solid.
honest-to-goodness kitchen table
type. One or two kinds of chairs
are perhaps not unattractive. They
have a slight leg which carries a
1a1nt memory Of the 18th century
with it. but somehow the designers
nave missed the charming simplicity
OF the old wheel back chairs one
still sees in village kitchens and
there Is nothing as attractive as the
ladder-backed chairs of our grand
fathers. However, the furniture is
solid and presumably is produced
with minimum of labor.
Austerity is felt most in the cut
ting down of gasoline and automo-
biles. The car owner, except for
certain privileged folk, has long ago
laid up his car and has had to rely
on reduced railway service and
reduced bus service to go about his
business. The result has been an
enormous crowding of such trans
port methods as still remain.
Transportation Is Bottleneck.
The bottleneck of the railway and
the bus in England is very bad one
and 1t is slowing down the whole
life and tempo of the country. In
London. where many people are
forced to take the subway or buses,
where they would have driven to
their work in their own cars before,
you must allow about four times as
much time to get from one part of
London to another as was necessary
before austerity set in.
live within wo-and-a-half miles
of Fleet street I reckon to cover
the distance by car in not much
more than 10 minutes. 1t now takes
me three-quarters of an hour to
make the journey in daylight and
anything up to an hour and half
after the blackout.
Now, we are told that a nation
wide census of laid-up cars is to be
taken preparatory to the requisition-
ing of cars and tires by the govern
ment. I should think 1t unlikely
that the thousands of cars now laid
up will be taken by the government
because the public service is already
we'll supplied with rolling stock of
every kind and more cars imply
more gasoline, which the government
cannot afford to squander. Tires,
however, are badly wanted and it is
possible that the government will
take vehicles merely in order to
requisition the tires.
All requisitioned tires and vehicles
will be paid for and owners will have
a right to appeal II the sum offered
by the Government assessor Is
deemed insufficient. One thing this
requisitioning is going to do is to
put an end to the racket in small
cars which has sprung up in Eng
land. Owing to the difficulty OF
obtaining gasoline many well-to-do
men have laid up their big cars and
have been buying smaller vehicles,
with the result that the price of
little secondhand runabouts has
gone up sometimes more than
double the price of cars when new,
and people have been found to pay
these heavy prices cheerfully.
Tons Of Railings Removed.
There have been hundreds of
thousands of tons Of railings re-
moved from the fronts of houses
and from around gardens and parks,
also iron gates, to be used for NUM-
tions of war, but there are still vast
quantities of unsightly iron railings
and gates which could well be
thrown into the melting pot.
The law provides that railings of
artistic or historic interest should
not be touched and there have been
q good many disputes where owners
have claimed that their ironwork
was of such artistic merit that it
should not be melted down. Per-
haps the most original reason for
not wanting iron railings removed
came from brewery in Bedford
shire, the owners of which said that