the following day, i visited another kind of toy factory. madame ..., who had lost her only son early in the war, works probably in the most inconvenient building in brussels, which she has free of charge. she works there all day long, every day, furnishing employment for between 30 and 40 girls, who would otherwise have to be on the soupes. i went from one room to another, where they were busily constructing dolls, and animals, and all sorts of fascinating toys out of bits of cotton and woolen materials—cheap, salable toys.
this is one of the things that we must [175]remember if we wish properly to appreciate the work the women are doing—most of it is being carried on in buildings that we should consider almost impossible—no elevators; everywhere the necessity of climbing long flights of stairs; no convenient sanitary arrangements—but nothing discourages them.
madame began by making bouncing balls in the belgian colors, stuffed with a kind of moss. they cost only a few centimes, and sold as fast as she could make them. when the order came that they were no longer to be made in these colors, she ripped up those she had on hand, and began new ones, omitting the black. the balls must go on. another day all the stuffing for her balls was requisitioned. she rushed out, up and down, street after street, seeking a substitute, and by night the little storeroom was filled with a kind of dry grass—and the balls could go on.
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the day of my first visit there were 6 of the 32 girls absent because of illness. madame said she usually had that large a percentage out because of intestinal troubles of one sort or another. they get desperately tired of their monotonous food, and whenever they can scrape together a few extra pennies, they go to one of the few chocolate shops still open and make themselves ill.
here, too, they are looking to america. if only they could get their toys to our markets, they could take in many who are suffering for want of work—and one feels that america would be delighted with every toy.
it is madame herself who designs them. she is trying always to get something new, striking. in the c. r. b. office one day i noticed a representative off in a corner, busy with his pencil, and found him struggling to represent some sort of balancing bird—a suggestion for madame.
toys created by women of belgium
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she makes these lovely toys from the veriest scraps of cloth, old paper, straw, with pebbles picked up from the roads for weights.
in the beginning she knew nothing at all about such work, nor did any one of the young girls she was trying to help. but such a spirit experiments! she ground newspapers in a meat-grinder to try to evolve some kind of papier-maché. she learned her processes by producing things with her own hands, and then taught each woman as she employed her. thus she, too, is not only keeping her corps from the present soup-line, but preparing a body of trained workers for the future. the shops in brussels sell these toys—a few have reached as far as holland.
everywhere in belgium one is imprest with the facility in the handling of [178]color, of clay or wood. there is the most unusual feeling for decorative effect; the tiniest children in the schools show a striking aptitude for design and modeling, and an astonishing sense of rhythm. one is constantly struck by this; it is a delight to hear a group of three-year olds carrying an intricate song without accompaniment, as they go through the figures of a dance.
