I am not speaking of German morals in general, which are notorious.  I merely state the practical way the Germans turn the women of the street into useful munition makers.

The lot of the German woman has been much more difficult than the lot of her sister in the Allied countries, for upon her has fallen the great and increasing burden of the struggle to get enough to eat for her household.  In practically all classes of Germany it has been the custom of the man to come home from his work, whether in a Government office, bank, or factory, for his midday meal, usually followed by an hour’s sleep.

The German man is often a greedy fellow as regards meals.  For him special food is always provided, and the wife and children sit round patiently watching him eat it.  He expects special food to-day.  The soldier, of course, is getting it, and properly, but the stay-at-homes, who are men over forty-five or lads under nineteen, still get the best of such food as can be got.  Exceptions to the nineteen to forty-five rule are very few indeed.  National work in Germany means war work pure and simple, and now the women are treated exactly as the men in this respect, except that they will not be sent to the front.

In January, 1917, Germany at length began formally to organise the women of the country to help in the war.  Each of the six chief army “commands” throughout the Empire now has a woman attached to it as Directress of the “Division for Women’s Service.”  Hitherto, as in England, war work by women has been entirely voluntary.  The Patriotic Auxiliary Service (Mass Levy) Law is not compulsory so far as female labour is concerned.  German women, however, having proclaimed that they regard themselves liable for national service under the spirit if not the letter of the law, it has finally been decided to mobilise their services on a more systematic basis than in the past.

None of the countless revolutions in German life produced by the war outstrips in historical importance this official linking up of women with the military machine.  Equally striking is the fact that the directresses of Women’s Service, who hold office in Berlin, Breslau, Magdeburg, Coblenz, Konigsberg, and Karlsruhe, are all feminist leaders and promoters of the women’s emancipation movement.  The directress for the Mark of Brandenburg (the Berlin-Potsdam district) is an able Jewess named Dr. Alice Salomon, who is one of the pioneers of the German women’s movement.  The main object of the “Women’s Service” Department is to organise female labour for munitions and other work from which men can be liberated for the fighting line.