decline in their health.
Mrs. Rihan: Most of our illnesses, with us, come from “our stomachs.”
Mr. Khallat: The important thing is that the man consent to this rationing...
And when he sensed an attack coming from the ladies' side, he added by way of clarification:
Not giving one's whole attention to meals is a sign of a people's rising standard. The poor or simple class spends from 90 to 95 percent of its income on food. The middle class spends 80 percent. As for the rich or the thinking class, it spends no more than 25 percent of its income on food.
Mrs. Karanful: Woman must then join man in work: in earning a sum of money.
Mr. Khallat: A splendid idea, if she finds that work. But the important thing for our subject is that woman should not hold back from buying what is offered in the market. And if she wishes to economize, she should reduce or refrain from consuming everything imported from abroad and confine herself to national products.
Here Mrs. Najjar asked Mr. Khallat:
— But have we any national products?
Mr. Khallat: Yes, we have clothing, and shoes, and all kinds of foodstuffs.
Mrs. Karanful: First — will the seller of imported goods be harmed?
Mr. Khallat: His prices
Ellen Rihan says:
“Honorable families will go hungry, so we must concern ourselves with these families of hidden need...”
will inevitably rise a little after the crisis, enough to make up for the drop in income from the smaller quantity sold.
Mrs. Najjar: The Village Welfare Society will work to make use of our agricultural products, by preparing dried and canned products — vegetables and fruits — and selling them at reasonable prices to housewives. In this way it will find work for a number of people, and meet our need for such items as we now import.
Mr. Khallat: There is a sensitive side of the subject we have not treated — I mean the social side. If the crisis grows severe, and some industrialists dispense with their workers, and the doors of employment are closed in their faces, how will those families face the economic crisis?
Mrs. Karanful: That is the task of our women's associations.
Mrs. Rihan: Honorable families will go hungry, and at no price will they bring themselves to ask; so we must concern ourselves with these families of hidden need.
Mrs. Najjar: Woman must devote all her attention, in dealing with the crisis, to these families of hidden need.
Mrs. Abou al-Jbein: We
have agreed that the housewife must adopt “moderation” in managing the affairs of the house. To this plan should be joined the setting aside of one day each week on which the family buys no fruit, the sum being collected to aid the family of hidden need — in every quarter, and street, and village...
Mr. Khallat: A splendid idea, if it is applied.
Mrs. Karanful: Applying it is easy, if in every quarter a league is formed to carry out the necessary contacts and tasks.
Mrs. Najjar: And the league's work is to strive to find employment for the men of the families of hidden need, to bring them out of the crisis.
Mr. Khallat: And with this we shall have treated the crisis with sincerity and realism, and preserved the good bond that ties the Lebanese family together to face every problem.
Mrs. Rihan laced her fingers one in another and murmured:
Finally, we must pray for Lebanon.
The gazes of those present fixed themselves on the floor tiles, and they murmured a prayer to God to illumine hearts, and to sow goodness anew upon the earth.
Neamat Karanful says:
“Woman must join man in work, in earning money...”
Dear reader:
The hearts of the world today drip blood over beloved Lebanon, at the funeral of the most fearful ordeal it has known in its history, one that strikes down the lives of its innocent sons.
Have you contented yourself, in showing your patriotic feeling, with silent anguish and prayer?
Or have you answered the voice of conscience, calling you to noble human giving?
Have you donated a handful of your blood to save the victims from death? Have you known the delight of giving, from the most sacred and precious thing you possess, for the most honorable and loftiest patriotic end??
If you have done so, it is by your true national consciousness;
If not, then hasten now to get in touch with the Lebanese Red Cross —
at the laboratory of the Hôtel-Dieu hospital
or with Mrs. Eva Sarhal, telephone number 30181
lest this great human honor pass you by!
My sister, woman...
Wounded Lebanon needs your blood.
...Long live Lebanon!