De Gustibus . . .

Last week, delighted Viennese were eating bananas for the first time since the war.

When they went on sale at a small shop next door to a Russian headquarters building, the Communist daily, Volks-stimme, huffed: "Bananas, yet! Apparently there are no more important foodstuffs we can import against our industrial goods. Bananas, yet!"

Next day, the obliging Socialist Arbeiter Zeitung, which seems to do a lot of Volksstimme's legwork,* revealed that the bananas came to Austria as part of a barter deal between Russian occupation forces and the Italians. Viennese really owed their thanks to a Soviet inspection officer who, it appeared, had never before seen a banana. The inspector had chomped a big bite of one--skin & all. Tasted horrible. His ruling: ". . . Unfit for Russian military personnel--dispose of them on the Austrian economy."

* A fortnight ago, when Volksstimme railed against importation of a batch of U.S. made cars, Arbeiter Zeitung disclosed that the cars were for the use of the Soviet authorities.

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