That would have been very well had the several governments bought all supplies from the producer direct through the medium of a purchasing branch of the commissary department. Such was not the case, however. The government continued to buy through war purveyors, who had, indeed, been curbed a little, but only in exchange for other privileges. Standing in well with the military, these men were able to sell out of the commissary-supply zones what the armies did not need--poultry, butter, fats, and eggs, for instance. These little side lines paid very well. I remember discovering on one trip that near Prague could be bought a whole goose for what in Vienna two pounds would cost. Since the Bohemian geese are never small birds, and weigh from nine to twelve pounds, this was a case of five to one. When in the cities butter was almost a thing unknown, I was able to buy in Bohemia any quantity at the very reasonable price of twenty-seven cents American a pound. In Vienna it cost one dollar and thirty cents a pound after the food shark had been satisfied.
The military-supply-zone arrangement made exports from districts affected to the large population centers impossible, except upon special permit, which was not easy to get by the man who had no "protection," as they put it in Austria. The food shark always interfered. In doing that he had a sort of double objective. Scarcity was forcing up the prices in the cities, and when the government had been persuaded that the prevailing maximum price was not "fair to the farmer" the shark had a reservoir to draw upon.
I found a similar state of affairs in Galicia. On the very outskirts of Cracow I ran into a veritable land of plenty. The military zone had completely isolated this district, and while elsewhere people had not seen butter in weeks, it was used here for cooking, and lard served as axle-grease. Finally the zone was opened to the civilian consumer. But this concession benefitted only the food sharks. In the population centers prices remained what they had been.
I found similar conditions in Germany, though the cause was not entirely the same.
The Mecklenburg states still have a government and public administration scheme that has come down to our day from the Middle Ages without much modification. They have no constitution as yet, and they would have no railroads, I suppose, were it not that their neighbors had to get access to one another through these principalities. The two countries are hard-boiled eggs indeed. And the Mecklenburgers are like their government. I understand that some enlightened ruler once offered his people constitutional government, but had a refusal for his pains.