Evening Star Newspaper, November 30, 1930, Page 47

» SANCHEZ CERRO FACES DIFFICULTIES IN PERU Little Colonel, Leader of -Revolution, Is Master of Homeland From Which He Twice Was Exiled. BY EDWARD TOMLINSON. HE night was Ethiopian. You «“ could have cut it with & knife, and, except for the lapping of the waves against the ship, as quiet as a morgue. “I had come aboard at 11 o'clock. Early in the evening I had called at the presidential palace in Lima, and they had told me of the defection in the garrison at Arequipa. No doubt that the situation was well in hand, though. Anyhow, the strong man was at the helm. Many a disturbance such as this had been put down in the 11 years of Leguia’s regime. ‘The Roose- velt of South America’ knew his Peru- vians! So to sleep. “A knock at my door. from the President? Strange, I thought. Surprising when I read it. I leaped into my uniform, sent orders to all the officers, dispatched a launch and waited. “Finally the chug of the motor and the return ‘of the launch. Up the lad- der came the diminutive figure of a very old man. The crew stood at attention. Officers saluted. The President was aboard! Ruler Near Breakdown. “Rumors spread. Nobody knew what it was all about. The President had sald nothing. Was he still the Presi- dent? And what was his mission on board a warship in the small hours of the morning? “There was a hurried conference of officers. Each contributed the rumors he had collected and offered his sugges- tions. Finally we invited his excellency to tell us the state of affairs. “Haggard and nervous he came be- fore us, a group of officers of the Peru- vian Navy, at 4:30 in the morning, and told us of the dramatic incidents of the last few hours—a haggard and nervous old man, who until recently had been the most powerful figure of the Andean republics. Cabinet Forced to Resign. “His cabinet had been forced to re- sign. A group of army officers had urged a military cabinet in its place. Yielding, he appointed one and went to bed. Shortly they called him to his office and demanded changes. Invit- their suggestions, he appointed an- other and started to swear it in. Some one objected. The colonel at Arequipa, Banchez Cerro, who had started the re- volt irf the army, should be in the cab- inet. The President acceded. But there were further objections on the grounds that some of the appointees were not present, notably the colonel from Are- quipa. Several spoke in a disrespectful | manner, some were even intoxicated. Suddenly a lieutenant pushed his way in and with revolver drawn demanded the immediate resignation of the Chief Executive. = The entire group then flopped and joined in the demand. The ation was penned and the Presi- dent fled to the cruiser Almirante Grau. “‘But,’ said. the President, ‘only the Congress has the right to accept my Tesignation. Until Congress meets and accepts it in the constitutional way, I am President of Peru!’ And there was & momentary spark of the old Leguia. The tmu% snapped to attention and sa- luted. President returned the salute and went back to his quarters, Power of Decision Gone. “Immediately he sent for me, and there, as the first streak of dawn crept over the mountains, he complained that was tired. He looked it—not only tired, but broken. His hands !flfle& .| United States and the “Later in the day orders came from the military junta which had taken over affairs at Lima, ordering the ship to proceed with the former President to Tecognize this group of senile and fat old generals. And Leguia came back, to be sent in disgrace first to the bleak island of San Lorenzo and later to the historic old prison in Lima, there to await the fate that has overtaken many Pemmm dx:nn H‘mnul the mm‘:x‘y m?;eer of , and, cu ly enoug] ate he himself has meted out to scores of his enemies. And in his own words, ‘an- other _geflod in Peruvian history is In these words the officer in com- mand of the Peruvian navy on that fateful night recounted briefly the final swiftly moving incidents that catapulted the once powerful Leguia from the presidency to n. Today & tiny Indian with deep, dreamy eyes occupies the seat of Pizzaro in the old land of conquest. He is Luis Sanchez Cerro, until August 20, 1930, an obscure colonel in the Peruvian army, stationed in a far interior valley of the Andes—the heart of the ancient empire of the Incas. Indian Blood Evident. ‘Tiny, I said. He is almost that— probably 5 feet 3 and weighs not more than 140 pounds. He is Indian, pre- dominately if not wholly. Brownish black eyes, “dreamy eyes” whose vision seems far away in the deep valleys of Peru’s tall mountains. I had come to Peru and Lima on ths very heels of the revolution. Flying from Talara to Lima over the remains of anclent citles and civilizations, over dry, dusty deserts gashed at intervals by narrow green valleys that follow half- dry rivers out to the Pacific, and peace- ful little towns surrounding tall gray churches, this languid country appeared undisturbed by the recent upheaval. From above, Lima {tself, the great “City of the Kings,” seemed unchanged. But there was a change readily apparent ‘when you came to earth and heard the ‘voices of people in the streets and cafes. A strict government, a hard master had gone. A new order prevalled. Another of Peru's long line of rulers occupled the historic government house on the Plaza de about him. He had been expelled from the country, taken back and expelled again. He had lived in France but finally had been permitted to return. Lately he had been colonel of & reg- ment in Arequipa. That was all they ed to know. Access Proves Simple. ‘To see him, swamped as he was with tion—the problems that went with the sudden scra and mot-ben'lnd wives :‘I s0l- prisoners, sa ly one or something. All i | o~ 's-eye ma~ h i £ H A message | t|hand, I admire them. Because, some ple furniture, a piano (evidently Leguia was musical), pictures—one of the for- mer dictator tmulf-wme'lhnt anti- “To B. Leguia,” from the brothers of a well known monastery. Discussion Unguarded. Presently a door opened and “the tiny | Indian with deep, dreamy eyes,” in the simple khaki uniform of a colonel, walked briskly in, unattended, shook hands, sat down and began talking. There was no show of importance, no attempt to impress a forelgn writing man, but marked simplicity and unmis- | takable earnestness. I have had oppor- tunities to meet many South American personalities—statesmen, generals and scholars. This little colonel, who had 80 suddenly, almost overnight, caused the overthrow and imprisonment of the most spectacular figure in modern Pe- ruvian history, a feat eminently suffi- clent to warrant a feeling of impor- tance, is about the most unassuming figure that I have ever met south of Panama. With nobody ‘to prompt him, to listen in or even to look on, he sat and talked most unreserved manner. But those deep, dreamy eyes and that simple, unassuming manner must not be taken as indications of weakness. He has been a bold figure. Twice he was banished from Peru for leadir.g revolts against the government, his active par- ticipation in which. is witnessed by many scars and the entire absence of a forefinger of his left hand. Born in 1889, Sanchez Cerro was graduated from military school in 1910, and thereafter served in various regi- ments until February 4, 1914. On that date came the revolution which over- threw President Guillermo Billinghurst. Banchez Cerro player an active part in that revolt, Leads First Revolt. In 1919 Leguia became President by a coup d’etat. A revolt was expected, and in 1922 it came, with the dreamy-eyed Sanchez Cerro at its head. He took Ppossession of the city of Cuzco, but was 80 seriously wounded that he lost what advantage he had obtained and the rev- olution ended. Sanchez Cerro discreetly | left for Morocco, where for 14 months he fought the Riffs. Later he went to France, devoting several years to ad- vanced' military courses, | Back in Peru again, he obtained com- | mand of a battalion and was promoted to a lieutenant coloneley last Summer. But his bold career was not ended. Three months ago came his second re- volt against Leguia. This time his fear- lessness brought success. Following his ; h, but in l bid for power in the soutl the face of an uncertain state of affairs in the capital, he took a couple of aides With him, flew to Lima ahead of his own forces, deposed the self-appointed junta, jailed them and proceeded to or- ganize his own military government. 1 am very happy thaf. you came to see me, that you have come to Peru,” he told me. “You have come to a coun- try that is old, that has suffered much. freedom. Nobody dared speak his thoughts unless they were the thoughts of the government. Newspapers could publish nothing that did not compli- ment the government. El Comercio, an old and honorable publication, did not publish an editorial in 11 years, until now. Men were banished for their con- hile their wi families suffered alone.” This in almost plaintive tones. o Americans Invited. oEp SiEL b T o lers T a1 m"ww . ow ing said that I particularly unmznsly toward ul: ple from there. This is not true. the other individuals from your country have, un- fortunately, made here is no reason for condemning a whole nation. “All those who have misused their t;glr:u‘mn prlvi}eg’a:m must, _-‘r‘;;wer ae- court of ice. t; should be punished; the lnnocen.;ule{ free. But no one who has been honest needy fear. I will nhe to that, “Your country has many interests here—mines, banks, railroads, airways. They are safe and welcome; all I ask is that those at the head of them re- spect us, that they do not look upon us in a patronizing manner. Peru has a glorious history and an ancient cul- ture of which she is proud. Peru has long been an admirer of the United States—indeed, has emulated it. And we invite your people here, if they come in good faith. Nowhere will they be more cordially received and respect- fully treated.” Tribal Origin Evident. ‘Then the conversation turned to the purpose of the revolution. The dreamy eyes fairly glistened and his sentences were punctuated with many, but grace ful, gestures. As I listened to the soft, firm voice I felt sure his spirit trav- eled back over the centuries to the glamorous days of the Incas, when their fi)wer reached undisputed from what later became Colombia to what now is Chile. “Peru is a treasure house. Her moun- tains offer us copper, silver and gold. Her valleys grow cotton, sugar e, coffee and fruit. She can produce countless things — enough for ~herself and a surplus for the world. No coun- try is richer in rescurces. Yet she is poor today. Her future has been mort- gaged—many of her resources have been parceled out to concessionaires and the money squandered or stolen. The people could bear this no longer nndm'de have done what they wished us 0.” Patience His Idea. But Sanchez Cerro is not an extrem- ist. He counsels patience and justice. He will be reasonable if the country will let him. Two days before my conversa- tion with him I watched a huge dem- onstration in the Plaza de Armas, where thousands gathered before the palace (o express impatience with the slow procedure of the tribunal appoint- ed to try the former officials and of- fenders. “They demand blood—that is, extreme measures,” sald a prominent business man. Sanchez Cerro with his cabinet ap- peared on the balcony, listened to the speeches and answered questions. It was an unusually orderly gathering. Only one man attempted to heckle him and, quick as lightning, pointing di- rectly at the disturber, Cerro shouted “Silencia!” (Silence!), to the evident approval of the great crowd. |, UIt is justice we wish to exercise,” he | told them, “not revenge. We have to | think not only of ourselves, but of other people also, the good will of the world. We must have evidence before we can punish men. The revolution was for the purpose of establishing a govern- ment of laws and not of men.” ‘The crowd went away quietly and evidently satisfied. Newspapers all commented most favorably the next morning. Sincerity Unquestioned. Sanchez Cerro’s sincerity and patri- otism appeared unquestioned by either natives or foreigners. Of course, the natives probably would be slow to criticize him to a visitor, therefore their praises of him may be discounted or passed over. But the head of a large foreign interest said: “I have the utmost confidence in the good intentions of this man. He is If he gets the right will put down graft in government, and government here had become the instrument m‘:fl were | el v e e THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C., NOVEMBER 30, 1930—PART TW Red Gag Upon Literature State Controlled, Every zlook Must Contain Propaganda—Death Knell for Originality. —Drawn for The Bunday Star by Stockton Mulford. IN RUSSIA THE WRITER'S HANDS ARE TIED, NO MATTER WHAT SUBJECT, WHAT PROBLEM HE TACKLES. BY ALEXANDER 1. NAZAROFF. N the list of notorious places shown by Soviet guides to foreigners vis- iting Moscow there usually figures, among other items, the Art Club of that city. The place, indeed, is worth seeing. It is here that “all lit- erary Moscow” gathers. It is here, too, that the Soviet literati dine, wage vio- lent verbal battles over various artistic events and problems and offer lavish libations to Bacchus. s The crowd gathered in the club is typical of the cataclysm through which Russia has passed. Alongside of an emaciated, long-bearded intellectual of “civilized” suit (apparently dating from heavy proletarian invective—after the In the years from 1918 to 1921, which pre-revolutionary days), one sees groups | revolution unprintable words are freely | were the years of terror, anarchy and of young, husky fellows with brutish faces and dirty hands, in high boots and Russian shirts—men one would expect to meet in the docks or factories. Young ballerinas and actresses in bourgeols silk stockings and cheap but stylish Parisian dresses (in spite of Socialism they, poor souls, sesm to take such pains to live up to the fashions of the ‘“capitalistic world!”) flirt with hatry critics, or in the next hall melt away to the sounds of & fox trot (al- though Communists condemn this “bour- geols invention,” Bohemians seem to adore it). In the uproar of loud voices printed and uttered. . The excellent Empire furniture of mahogany and bronze adorning the spagious and com- fortable rooms of the club seem to look with astonishment at this gathering; it saw other times and manners; it had | been requisitioned from the homes of | men of the old regime. Of all the products of the Soviet rule, Soviet literature and literary life are the least known outside of Russia. This is a pity. For this literature is an ex- periment not less baffling than Soviet economics. The writer, his work and his relations with the state—all these the old regime, wearing a threadbare'and laughter one may hear at times a | elements of it are experimental. The Story the Week Has Told BY HENRY W. BUNN. HE following is & brief summary of the most important news of the world for the seven days ended November 29: GREAT BRITAIN.—Great Britain is faced by the menace of a strike of prac- tically all the coal miners of the realm. New arrangements respecting pay and hours are necessitated by the going into effect on December 1 of the new mines act, and the workers are not satisfled with the owners’ proposals. The gov- ernment is bustling itself desperately to save the situation. A similar menace threatens in the railway industry, but not so immediately. ‘The total of registered unemployed in Great Britain in mid-November was 2,286,000 more by over a million than s 12-month previous. ~ kgn }!ovember .2:“ a Conhzervulve mo- of censure against the government was rejected by the House of Commons, 299 to 234, the Liberals supporting the government. There were circumstances of indecorum. The motion denounced the government for “failure to promote any effective proposals for the exten- sion of empire trade and refusal to consider the offer made (in the Im- germ Conference) by the dominions.” t 1s understood that the Conservatives will soon move another vote of censure against the government for allowing the dyestuffs act to lapse, the which lapsing (on January 15 next) will leave the British dyestuffs industry un; against the so powerful German indus- try, which is combined in a single cor- poration with & capital of $200,000,000. The Canadian Pacific Hotel, in fa- mous Berkeley Square, lon, con- struction of which is beginning, will be Imd;n";ulll-wuttmtel‘l;y. closed the Cunard super- liner, about to be laid down, will b:eo( 173,000 tons, with a length of 1,018 feet. In 1921, according to the census of that year, there were 1,283,00C persons engaged in agriculture in Great Britain, of a total of 17,000,000 persons ‘“en- gaged.” In the neighborhood of 25,000,- 000 acres were in cultivation, one-third in crops, two-thirds for pasture. British farm products have about half the total value of foods imported. The annual wheat crop is 50,000,000 bushels, as against about 200,000,000 imported. tic meats, however, about equal Ezm‘.m t'Ig:; gércn—m Britain sup- ul o eeds - spect of foods. i e * ok GERMANY.—TIt is officially announced that the German government has not the slightest intention, for the present, of asking for a moratorium on the post- ponable parts of Germany’s reparations payments under the Young plan, Stzl- taneously appears the announcement of a gigantic bullding program under contemplation by the North German Lioyd and Hamburg-American Lines, Wwhich obviously would have to be b ly financed by foreign capital. The sig- uificance of the relation between the two announcements is apparent. If the foreign capital is to be obtained, Ger- man credit abroad may not be impaired. The total of registered unemployed in Germany in mid-November was about 3,500,000, more by 400,000 than at the end of September. * ok % RUSSIA.—On November 25 the trial began in Moscow, amid most dramatic circumstances, of ;\fm engineers and professors chai th participation in an international plot aimed at over- throw of the Soviet regime. The scene of the trial is & room of “Union House,” 8lso called the House of Columns, one- time & club house of the Moscow upper set, now the headquarters of the Soviet labor federations. A magnificent cham- ber, once the ball room of the club, dazzling white with Corinthian columns a1 about, the hite nmfim&m for nonce by red carpe! draped in red. with a pince-nez,” the same who pre- sided at the famous Shakhta affair. ©Of the accused, six, I believe, have confessed guilt and two have main- tained silence. As happened in the case of one of the accused in the Shakhta affair, the son of one of the two, a member of the Communist youth or- flnlnunn. denounces his father, pub- licly repudiates him, demands the se- verest punishment for him—an incred- ibly hideous reversal of the case of Brutus. 8o far the confession of Prof. Ramsin has attracted chief attention. He tells of helping to “prepare the ground for & Franco-Polish intervention” that was to have taken place in the Summer just passed, asserts that he had assurance that Prench authorities “were eager for intervention and judged the time ripe.” But whatever the elements of men- decity and fantasticality, there’s no OME years ago I met 2 man who spoke as follows: “The boss issued a memo- randum today with a lot of new Instructions. Some of them were all wet, and I didn’t hesitate to tell him so. I shot a memo right back at him, and, believe me, it was a hot one.” Sald another man: “I received my first business training under a wise old bank official. One day a letter came in from a customer who made unreasonable com- ' plaints and asked for an un- warranted favor. “I sat up almost all night drafting an answer to that letter. It was a beauty, and I took it in to the old man next morning with pride. His head nodded approvingly as he read it. “‘You've put the case just right,’ he said. ‘The position you have taken is based on sound banking principles; it states our attitude with dignity and force. All in all, it’s a very fine letter, and I col tulate you on it. Only, ll’g-" eaven'’s sake, don’t send Afterwards, I learned that the man I fi quoted was d $4,000 a year; the other pald $40, Like every other man in business, I receive a certain number of communications which are both unkind and unfair. Having red hair and a naturally quick temper, I used to let such letters hoist doubt the Muscovite proletariat are convinced of an international anti- Soviet plot, and no doubt that the gov- ernment is more than content that they should be so convinced. As the trial began, in%he evening, the snow-covered streets were filled with marching columns—as many, ‘tis said as half a million men, women and chil- dren singing, carrying torches and ban- ners with such legends as “Down with the jackals of foreign imperialists.” “Dox with Poincaire and the ofl king: For the men this demonstration fol- lowed a working day of six to eight hours. Yledl. indeed, there’s drama still in the world. It is difficult to follow the details of the fantastic business. A?crmuy all the accused have now pleaded guilty. There is a pretty gen- DON’T SEND IT BY BRUCE BARTON my temperature considerably. Sometimes I carried them around in my mind_ for several days, forming red hot phrases in reply. Now I play a much meaner trick on the writers. I do not answer them at all. I can .imagine one of my critics going down to the front gite every morning to meet the man, look] ngi eagerly for y answer, thinking up what he will say in his next out- burst. Day after day goes by, and no answer comes. The fire that was to burn me up, burns him up instead. This method of dealing with one’s enemies is cer- tainly not spectacular and may be it is unmanly. If so, I can reply only that as I grow older the glory of being. spectacular appeals to me less and less in comparison with the comfortable joys of peace. Life seems somehow too short for controversy, and much of my income in these days is received not so much for what I do as for what I have learned not to do. Patience, I have learned, is almost as important as work; while judgment uniformity commands & much higher rate than well intentioned activity. What is d}ldfment? u ask. Well, it’s the little voice that whispers: “That would be nt, but don’t do it.” Or, “that’s a smart one; very smart indeed. But, for heaven’s sake, don't send it.” (Copyright, 1930.) civil war, the pre-revolutionary Russian literature walked out of Russia. Unwill- ing to submit to the Soviet regime, most | of the outstanding old writers emigrated to Western Europe. The place thus vacated was occupled by new men. They bobbed up with astonishing quickness in those hectic lyurs when all walked hungry and when {hardly anything could be printed be- | cause of the absence of paper, a strange |itch to write seemed to have seized the whole country. At nolsy meetings in theaters draped with red flags there ap- peared individuals— young, declassed (Continued on Fourth Page.) eral opinion in the world at large that the weird story told by Ramsin and the others evolved itself under the prelim- inary Ogpu examination. Among those mentioned as arch-conspirators are Poincaire, Briand, “Col. Lawrence” (presumably Lawrence of Arabia, alias “Lord - Churchill” (presumably Winston Churchill is intended). France, it seems, was to send military instructors and airplanes to aid Poland and Ru- mania in an attack on Russia. Suppos- ing the story a tissue of pure men- dacity, it seems crude enough, but one must éudce the artistry by the cor- respondence of effects to alms. If aimed at arousing popular passion by way of diverting popular attention from economic malease, it would seem to be an artistic masterpiece. ERE INDIA.—There is poignancy and significance in the campaign of speech- making now being made in this coun- try by Rabindranath Tagore, the In- dian poet, novelist, playwright, teacher and seer, master of a beautiful style in English as well as Bengall. Tagore is, of course, a magnificent repwesentative of Indian personality and culture. He is a man of authentic genius, the ablest of a family marked by genius. Of liv- ing paladins of world harmony and co-operation he is perhaps the most shining. I sald “poignancy,” for he is old, broken in health, scarce able to stand or speak at all, and no doubt stirred to the depths by consideration of the present supreme crisis of Indian destiny. I cannot but think that of all current experiments in education that of Tagore's school at Santiniketan (“the home of peace”) must be the most interesting. Tagore, it should be remembered, has stood out for drastic reconstruction of Indian society. He is very keenly aware of our faults, but no less aware of the virtues of our civili- zation and of how India might profit by them. * K K STATES.—The keel of one of the two 40,000-ton liners which are to be built for the United States Lines under its contract with the Federal Government will be laid on December 4 at the yard of the New York Ship- building Co. at Camden, N. J. The keel of the sister ship will be laid within a few months. The lhlfinwtll ply between New York and England. ‘They are planned to maintain a speed of about 22 knots. Each will carry about 1,300 passengers—600 first class, 490 tourist and 230 third class. are to be followed by two still larger ships. I hear that these superliners are to be of 50,000 tons and of speed superior to that of the Bremen. A book has just appeared which should have & hty resound and which may profitably be read by all Americans. It is entitled “Universities —American, English, German,” and is ublished by the Oxford University Brn.s. its author being Dr. Abraham Flexner, formerly & director of the Gen- eral Educational Board and now head the new Institute for Advanced Study. Dr. Flexner lambastes terribly certain tendencies in our universities. ‘Those institutions are “becoming more and more tumultuous, have cheapened, v and mecl themselves. ‘The sort of easy rubbish which may be counted toward an A.B. degree, or the | 5 so-called combined degree, passes the limit of credibility.” The doctor is especially severe on Harvard’s Graduate School of Business, on Columbia’s School of Journalism, on the fantastic rtising h’y’ " “euthenics” eo.'“ rly contributing to 8 . If the courses not ly making for a degree were elim- ted, the problem of excessive enroll- ment would cease to exist. The ancient lish universities, whatever their de- 1¢ “are bl.; mt:‘ootwhl‘her luflal;% incomparably superior to anything in America.’ Excellent. It is time for us to de- « on Fourth Page.) ‘Arcraftsman Shaw,” is meant) and | gards 3 LIVING COSTS IN EUROPE SHOWN WIDELY DIVERGENT Survey Based on British Life Finds Belgium Cheapest, Sweden Dearest for Small Salaried Family. BY FRANCIS W. HIRST. ONDON. — Americans are even more familiar than Eui with the extensive statistical sur- veys which are being undertaken for practical business purposes by large corporations and for political or politico-economic ‘gurpml by gov- ernments, Whether the scientific econ- omist can teach the city man how to ‘make money or the politiclan how to T et In] ly e that an ee{momm who has been turned into the servant of a bank or industrial company, or who has persuaded to join the civil service by the govern- ment in power, will maintain a high standard of excellence. Originality in. outlook or in speculative theory de mands perfect independence and free. dom. A professor writing to order is a mind in chains. Examines Maintenance Costs. Nevertheless, scientific methods to research work often produce valuable and interesting publications and in the end contribute usefully to the spread of information about social and economic conditions at home and abroad. To this class belongs a study recently prepared for Unilever, Ltd., the big soap and margarine combine, which has been reprinted in the Economist. Its object is to ascertain the compar- ative cost of maintaining, in seven of the most highly civilized and, probably, also the cheapest countries in Europe, typical English standards of life corre- sponding to English salaries of £500, £1,500 and £3,000 per annum. Unfor: tunately, America is left out of the pic- ture, but perhaps some enterprising university in the United States will give us comparable statistics for the United States, Canada, Mexico and the republics of South America. Task Difficult One. Although Unilever’s study, with its tables, only covers about a couple of pages of the Economist, the work of preparation involved must have been considerable, for the task was a diffi- cult one. The unit taken is that of a married couple with two children, a boy of 15 and a girl of 11 years old. The calculations cover cost of food, of serv- ants, clothing, rent, direct and indirect taxation (including local it ucation, motor cars, medical attendance and pleasures. As in England and some other countries, the rate of income tax depends partly on whether the income is earned or unearned. Unilever's study assumes that the income is entirely earned and that none is derived from investments. ‘The figures for England were derived from trustworthy statistics and from well known social and economic facts. To obtain comparative data for con- tinental countries, a questionnaire was sent to the offices of Unilever abroad, and the information so acquired was checked in various ways. Style Is Considered. ‘The comparative expenditures on food and clothing of a ried lishman at home and abroad, and the wages of servants in the different countries, were not difficult to ascertain, but one is a little amused to read that after consult- ing various distributive clothing firms and associations, Unilever's inquirers made allowances for the cost of main- taining the average English style of dress, adjusting it to suit special local conditions, which they illustrate by re- marking that “in Scandinavia a fur coat 1s & necessity, in France a luxury.” I should imagine that a salaried em- ploye in Sweden with £500 a year would not bé able to regard a fur coat for himself and his wife as a necessity; and most people who wish to combine warmth with comfort in a very cold ‘Winter would much fer a woolen coat to a coat of inferior fur. Unilever’s continental offices have supplied the items of rent, local - tion, the cost of heating, lighting, water, etc. Some difficulty arose as re- direct taxation, because in some | countries (perhaps the reference is to | Prance) Unilever understands that “taxation laws and regulations are not strictly applied.” Tariffs Perplex. In the same way, lexities may have been caused by differences in tariffs, because protective customs duties Taise ces of living, especially for small householders, by far more than the revenue they bring in to the ex- chequer. Another difficulty arises from education, because rich persons in Eng- land are apt to send their sons, and often their daughters, to expensive so- called pullflc schools, at whl‘cl:{x the average charge per annum Wwill vary from £150 to £250. In the specimen tables published by Unilever, the .differences between the annual salary end the annual expendi- ture is shown separately under the heading of “Surplus for Savings,” with such items as life insurance, clubs, recreations and holidays. Individual tastes differ so much that it is, of course, difficult to strike an average. is the same with motoring. In Unilever’s_calculation, a motor enters into the English budget when a man with a wife and two children possess an income of £900 per annum, whereas, it is said, in most European countries the equivalent salaries of £900 or even £1,000 would not carry an allowance for the upkeep of a motor car. I can- not help thinking that the average Eng- lishman with £900 a year, living in Lon- don, seldom possesses a motor car, though doubtless he has one if he lives in the suburbs or in a small provincial town. Costs Lowest in Belgium. We now come to the results of the investigation—that is to say, the esti- mated yearly expenditure of an average lish family of four persons, together st,t‘h the corresponding cost of main- taining & similar standard of comfort in Belgium (Antwerp), France, Den- mark (Co) n), Sweden (Stock- holm), Norway (Oslo), Holland (Rot- terdam) and Germany (Berlin). expenditure is not based upon an aver- age for Paris, and that in Belgium and Holland, Antwerp and Rotterdam are taken instead of the capitals, bably because Brussels and Amsterdam are notoriously expensive. But might not the same be said of Stockholm and Berlin, compared with other cities of weden and Germany? o ‘We begin with incomes of £500, taking the English index figure as 100 and the rest in percentages of 100. The tables show that for the possessor of £500 per annum the cost of living is lowest in Belgium, where the index number is only 87.4. In Holland it is 974. It is h!(iul in Sweden, where it is 138.4, and Norway, where it is 135. comes third with 126.4. ‘With a salary of £1,500, again & man Mo index Besce 1 ehven 18 811 Bui wl e 15 given as 81.7. this the Scandinavian (the Sweden (the England. with £500 a year pays £60 of it in direct taxes, Belgium £21 and in only £7. The low figure for is accounted for by the generous emptions from ipcome tax accorded 1o mipport. “The copraspending. o I U] e c the Norwegian budget is wm:lly £100. English Taxes High on Rich. On the other hand, when we come to the £1,500 income the tax- ation item has risen to £171, as come pared with only £86 for Belgium and £197 for Sweden. Norway still heads the list with regard to the £3,000 man. In this class Norway exacts £006, Ger- many coming next with £830, while Great Britain (in spite of the grumbles of taxpayers here) takes fifth place with £561. - Belgium in this case g by far the lowest with £187, and Sweden, w._}.h ?mm flan Enndl:nd'h:uh £413. res given under heading education also are perhaps worth com- ment, for in every case except the first— the £500 income—the Englis] spends more on this item than the foreigner. In the first case the figure given for England is £30, as against £20 for Bel- glum and £40 for Sweden, but under the £1,500 head the Englishman £105, against an average of £47 for other countries, and in the case of the £3,000 income this item accounts for £225 in Great Britain, whereas in the dearest of the other countries, Holland, it is estimated at only £97. Russian Plan Studied. Much more interesting and exciting t.!un' unllzver‘ldm:en‘lcuumh‘ are those of a correspondent of The Economist, who has been studying on the spot all the avallable statistical evidence re- lating to the famous economic five- year plan of Soviet Russia. It is more interesting and exciting because the success and the very existence of Sta- lin's government depend on the pros- pects and working of the piatiletka, or five-year plan. The Economist’s clal correspondent embodied all it he could collect in a supplement, which is fairly described as an objective, ;.hlouxh n: ;hye nmI e time ':rpm un- riendly study. am not to hnr‘gn there was great demand for the supplement and that it has been reprinted by The Economist. po= sition, progress and prospects, n'.hat o!"‘ fiumncy m; t“‘:.he w"? lex, ref prices.” Bul exception may be all-important. Granted that the official statistics of agricultural production and industrial output, of buildings erected and tons of coal raised and timber cut or exported, are all correct, a large assumption, what is to be sald about those statistics which are expressed in terms of paper rubles? Soviet Currency Inflated. ‘The well informed critic to whom I have referred, writing on Russian enigma, states that in October, 1925, the for in the next five months the torrent Dt e et 0 ek a e nuurnwih:ndw:lmmnh(o(_ Any one who exchanges his money for Russian at the officail rate of ex- modations are execrably bad and enar= mously more expensive than good food and good atcommodations in other Eu- ropean countries. The official prices of . food and goods sold in the Soviet and co-operative stores show a little ment, but these stores are quite quate and are supplemented by the markets. We are told that in all mar. at controlled prices have If then, continues the critic, the wage earner’s earnings, whether he be a free man or a conscript slave, have only in- creased at the rate shown in the sup- g::ment. mofi ml:l.lt nodw be hard m‘g economic position desperate. the value of the currency diminishes faster than his nominal clothing and other nec essaries of life in the free market at 5 to 10 times It will be noticed that the French - the official Soviet price. Press Works Overtime. Apparently tHe truth is that the So- viet government ‘“cannot rake = enough margins and surpluses from private gains and state enterprises to . y its way without resort to the print- presses.” The Soviet government anticipates from taxation 5,500,000, rubles this year, against 4,000,000, rubles last year, and expects 4,810,000,000 rubles this year enterprises, compared with 3,233,000,000 rubles last year. But all will leave a big deficit if doubles and its value is halved. works manager has to find , and to find this money th viet government orders its print press department to print more The traveler I have quoted its out that the people must have food, clothing and shelter, He insists that by currency and price tests these neces. sarfes are failing in Russia. Can & _ P belief in Leninism or Marx: ism supply the gap? Will promises and in place of more substan: viet regime collapse with the currency?” His answer is it next six months will tell.” 30,000 Have Radios ZEEERE ggggeggg L] E il EEE