[Illustration: THE ANTWERP MUSIC-HALL, NOW A SEWING-ROOM Here hundreds of women are being saved, by being furnished the opportunity to work two weeks in each month, on an average wage of sixty cents a week] But one could endure cold—anything is better than the moral degradation following long periods of non-employment. So it is not of the garments, but of the 9,500,000 francs dispensed as wages, that these women think. The work _must_ go on. “See,” Madame said, “what we do with the veriest scraps!” A young woman was putting together an attractive baby quilt. She had four pieces of an old coat, large enough to make the top and lining, and inside she was stitching literally dozens of little scraps of light woolen materials. Another was making children’s shoes out of bits of carpet and wool. In one whole section the girls do nothing but embroider our American flour sacks. Artists draw designs to represent the gratitude of Belgium to the United States. The one on the easel as we passed through, represented the lion and the cock of Belgium guarding the crown of the king, while the sun—the great American eagle—rises in the East. The sacks that are not sent to America as gifts are sold in Belgium as souvenirs. Each sack has its value before being worked. Many of them—especially in the north of France—have been made into men’s shirts, and tiny babies’ shirts and slips. Before July, 1916, in the Charleroi ouvroir, over 30,000 sacks had been made into 15,000 shirts at a cost of 25 centimes per sack, and a sewing price of 30 centimes each. Each Monday the women may work on their own garments, and on Tuesday all the poor of the city bring their clothing to be patched or darned. A shoe section, too, does what it can for old shoes. Such shoes and such remnants of socks and of shirts as we saw! But the more difficult the job, the happier the committee! During the week, courses are given in the principles of dressmaking and design. In the evening there are classes for history, geography, literature, writing, and very special attention is given to hygiene, which is taught by means of the best modern slides. These things are splendid, and with the three francs a week wages, spell self-respect, courage, progress all along the line. The committee has always been able to secure the money for the wages, but they can not possibly furnish the materials—sufficient new ones they could never have. They are living from day to day on the hope that the C. R. B. may be able to make an exception for the Antwerp ouvroir, and appeal once more for her precious necessity—“old clothes!” This the C. R. B. may be able to do—but will England feel equally free to make an exception to her ruling that since the Germans have taken the wool from the Belgian sheep, no clothing of any kind can be sent in?