The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

A Day With Mrs. Berry ciated privilege of spending a day With Mrs. Berry when she visited York County, And spending a day with Mrs. Berry is like spending a day with someone you have known all your life, and coming to understand why she gets along so well with people wherâ€" ever she goes, regardless of ways and customs entirely strange to her. When Mrs. Berry says “I can eat the food of any country." we see something of her friendliness and understandâ€" ing, her downâ€"Lovearth approach to whatever problem is before her. THE EDITOR had the very much appre- A Background That Helps Perhaps because Mrs. Berry has always done the cooking for her family. also produced some of their food. she is interested in how people are fed the world over. and we can imagine her exchanging recipes with women from Fin- land to Malaya. Because as a pioneer rancher's Wife, before she had electricity, she did her laundry With washaubs and a boiler. she is l“~7pct‘l-’Jll_V interested in the co-operative laun- drics hl'l up by some of the country women's groups in Germany and the Scandinavian rountrivs. These women cannot afford electric laundry equipment for their homes but their husbands have cooperative creameries and it is not [no costly to operate a laundry in the samu- or an adjoining building. letting the sur- plus sir-rim from the creamcry run the laundry machinery, Because the women have a com- mon mien-st in the laundry they have studied toga-titer textiles, detergents. buttons and how lhvsv should he handled in laundering. From this venture in a co-opcrative business some groups have gone on to establish co-operative dit-i-p»ti“t-cu- plants. It is well known that Mrs, Berry takes an :u-tirc part in work for incapacitated Girl Litiiili-s in Australia, getting companies estab- lished in Homes for Crippled Children. Schools for the Deaf and Dumb and Hospitals for Spiistics. She explained that this interest be- can Iii-rouse one of her own daughters, as a child, had a lubercular hip. Incidentally this daughter is now very well. is the mother of tour lovely children and helps her husband in the- packing sheds on their fruit farm. Mrs. Berry used in take this little girl to the assov nation meetings and she feels that she owes the women a debt of gratitude for the friend- liness and encouragement that was a help to both herself and her daughter at this time. We learned more about our international prestdent's personal interests and about her nntivc country Australia, and about what the Assocmted Country Women of the World means to women in far away places when Mrs. Berry spoke at the York County Women's lnstitutcs' Rally held at Dalziel Parkâ€"or really on the grounds of the home of Mrs. ‘ Charles Agnew, York County Womenv; I tutes' president. Agriculture in Australia Mrs. Berry is a widow operating he: sheep station, her husband having died . result of his experience in the first Worlri She owns 47,000 acres, running one sh. six acres. This she can do with the help i two men because there is no cold weal the area, the sheep do not have to be lz. barns, and the shearing is done as i work, the shearer bringing his own mi cooks and food and the owner providin. dormitories. There are also no dogs or - or other predatory animals in the sheep try of Australia. Water is the greatest problem of th tralian rancher or grazier. (A grazier ls. son in Australia occupying Crown in other land for sheep raising.) “The mostly are only rivers when it rains Mrs. Berry “and then they flood. Wt plough the land or we would have :i bowl; so we leave the virgin pasture Li and depend on Nature's bounty." In at. to the ranches or stations, Australia has small farms specializing in dairy, poul fruit. “Here the wives work closely. their husbands," Mrs. Berry continu- woman may take a baby with her to ll: barn and lay it in a manger while shr with the milking. Australia exports a dairy produce. It also grows and exp considerable quantity of pineapples and tropical fruits, peanuts and sugar cane Australian Women’s Associations And what do the Australian Countr men's Associations do? Perhaps one 0' most important functions is to providi panionship for women in a country ranches are so large that the homes an far apart and the women are sometimes . But the associations do not exist just to life happier for members. They are (loin: we in Ontario would call the “soundest ‘- Institute work" for their communitir' ‘ their people. And incidentally, becaus- need funds to do this local Work, some L have a rule that they will not give mor» a certain sum of money to any one It many outside agencies that appeal to the contributions. The Australian Country Women’s A: tions are active in the “Bush Children's I'i Scheme." Children from the bush C01» suffering from malnutrition or other to- are given a recuperative holiday at “1‘ side with fresh fruit and vegetables 1- dental care and hospitalization if this is t ed. Members of the country women's t2: act as escorts and assist in any way the:- They also work with health authoriti- “m Am COUNTRY