PACIFIC MAIL SERVICES.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 269, 13 November 1935, Page 27

PACIFIC MAIL SERVICES.

The Matson liner Lurline has just completed, a record passage of under 14 days from Los Angeles to Auckland, and English mails carried by tlie vessel were delivered in the city approximately 23 days after leaving London. By way of contrast it is interesting to note that the R.M.S. Aorangi is scheduled to sail from Auckland for Vancouver on Tuesday next, Xovcniber 12, and her mail is set down for arrival yi London on December 12, 30 days after departure from this port. The Lurline leaves Auckland on Saturday, November 10, on the usual north-bound run across the Pacific and her mail will reach London on December 11. In IS9-3—40 years ago—the mail service from Sydney to San Francisco, via Auckland and Island ports, was conducted by three small vessels of 3500 gross tonnage, the American owned Alamada and Mariposa, and the Union Company's Monowai. The mail carrying contract of those days provided for a 28-day service from Auckland to London, at three-weekly intervals. A subsidy was granted by the Australian and New Zealand Governments, but a substantial penalty was inflicted for late delivery of mail matter. It is worthy of mention that on one occasion the old Monowai—a single screw, coal burning steamer, made a record run across the Pacific and landed her mails in London 20 days after leaving Auckland. The largest vessel now employed in the Vancouver service ,i& the motor ship Aorangi, of 18,000 tons, designed to maintain a sea going speed of 18 knots, and she sliould certainly be eiipable of maintaining a much faster time-table than the little, toy ships of 1895. Let us - '" travel''under the Br it if/; flag by all means, but it is well to remember that speed is the essential factor in. a mail service, and vessels flying His Majesty's Roys] mail ensign should not be behind the times in that respect. EXPRESS SERVICE.

WOMEN AND WAR. I don't -understand why your correspondent "Disgusted Returned Soldier" read "with astonishment" the reference in my letter to the Labour party's attitude towards war. The party is and always has been against war and in favour, of settling international disputes by arbitration. Any of the candidates standing for election this month can tell him that. Nor is the remit he quoted, the same thing as a declaration for peace. It simply aims at improving the conditions of the armed forces of the Dominion, while the aim of most people working for peace is to render those forces unnecessary. The Labour party is in favour of a forty hours week, and no doubt when the opportunity comes to put its policy into practice will apply it to all sections of the workers. As for a forty hours week in the trenches, we are, I believe, all hoping and striving that the trenches, with their attendant horrors, will soon be a tiling of tli'e past, so that none of pjur boys will be called upon to endure them for even one hour. E.G.