The Standard of Wednesday began the publication of an interesting
series of articles on " New Germany " by Mr. Sidney Low, who has been visiting the country as a special correspondent. Mr. Low's subject is that industrial Germany which has grown up practically within the last two decades, and of which most English visitors are wholly ignorant. Ho points out that Germany has become an industrial country, and that, as in England, more people now live in the urban than in the rural districts. Towns which half-a-century ago were famous only for their galleries or their picturesque mediaeval survivals are now great hives of artisans. This change did not come to Germany, as it came to England, when municipal science was in its infancy; and so in Germany we see industry developing from the start under the most scientific conditions. Mr. Low is chiefly struck by the efforts of German authorities to make all parts of their cities agree- able to live in, and he thinks their municipal government the most efficient to be found anywhere. Our own public health system is better, and our method of paving greatly superior, but the level of apparent comfort in Germany is far higher. There are no such contrasts as between Piccadilly and Poplar, The lot of the German working man may be really a harder one, what with the high price of food and exorbitant rents, but at least he has an environment free from the worst kind of squalor. The aim of the authorities is " to render the town a pleasant place of residence for all classes by making every citizen feel that he is a member of a self- respecting community."
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