TOPICS OF THE DAY.

Press, Volume LV, Issue 9989, 19 March 1898, Page 7

TOPICS OF THE DAY.

Tfts average render, if he An Index « c . tho man wo take him to

to be, is quite content to have •'Pickwick." that degree of knowledge

of his "Pickwick" which gomes/rom picking it up from time to time and dipping into its ever-amu-ing pages, gut there mo.V be others who aspire to a deeper acquaintance with the book and its characters, and for these, ii any there be, »n industrious " book-maker " has ju3t produced an index which might almost lie called _ concordance. In compiling this book be has done what has never been done before for a novel. There are _f course, concordances to Shakespeare and Tennyson, and Cruden's well-known concordance ot the Scriptures, but Mr Neate's jHokis unique in its scope. Henceforth, 4_e person who wants to find a particular _u3_ge in "Pickwick" need not trust to Ljfflory, which is often unreliable in such matters,'nor bother himself by turning over the pages untiP he nits upon whafc he Wants—the "Index " will give it to him in a few seconds. Year?, ago Calverley set a stifT oamination pap?r in " Pickwick," which it h qn ite safe to say not one in a hundred of the readers of that immortal work could have passed with anything like credit. "How many readers," aeks Mr Noale in reference to this paper, " can tell you anything about Mr Brooks or Mr Staple, or Mrs .tunkin, or about Villam or Young Bantam or OldNobbs? How many can tell yon what the narcotic bedstead wai, or a redfaced Niton or a profeel-machine. And how many recollect when tho Fat Boy wa« not asleep ; what is ' taking a grinder ' ; who besides Mr Pickwick wore gaiters, and how the old l&dy made a memorandum at whist ?" Mr Neale's book would be most ><QWfol in cramming for a Piokwick examination, but the novel is such a wonderful proof of Dickens's infinite variety that it would require an excellent memqry to enable one to face the examiner with con fldenoe. To quote only a few of tbe individuals in "Pickwick"preferred to by Mr Nealo, what do most of our readers know about Charlie, Kate, Hunt, Mr Price, and Mrs Harris? Do they know that there is a Villam as well as a Villiam ? Could they say offhand whit part is played by Mr Noddy and what by Mr Neddy, or could they locate with "any degree ot success the two Bull Inns, the two Royal Hotels, the three White Harts, or the four High streets ? Our hand on it that they could not. And the public ignorance as to the two Jems and Johns, the five Toms and two Tommies, the three Janes and the five Marys (not counting a Mary Ann) is, we. feel sure, as deplorable as our own.

Taken all round, Lord Municipal Rosebery is probably one and of the best and most inParliamentary teresting public speakers Life. in the United Kingdom.

It is true that the light and jocular, almost flippant, style which makes his speeches so pleasant to read robs them of a good deal of the weight and influence which might be expected to attach to the utterances of a leading states. man, but this very quality only lends attraction to the occasional addresses he delivers on non - political matters. (The latest example of this kind of thing Was tho speech he made recently in Glasgow, when ha opened the fine new People's Palace just erected by public subscription aided by a grant from the CorporationLord Rosebery remarked that it was gratifying to notice that the corporations of the United Kihgdom were beginning to attend to the sanitation of the mind as well as ©f the body. He referred to the erection of free libraries, people's palaces, baths, gymnasium* and washhouses by municipalities, and predicted that when men who i-4 hitherto held aloof from municipal .government, saw the higher aims and wider work of the municipalities of to-day, they would no longer keep aloof. They would Wgard it as a doubtful choice whether they •could enter a great corporation or Parliament. As one who had been in Parliament, was still there, and had also been in a great 1 municipality—he was the first chairman of the London County Council—Lord Rosebery •aid he should be very doubtful what to say to any one who asked him for advice as to whether he should enter Parliament or the corporation of a great city. And then Lord Rosebery A gave his hearers some of Comparison, his opinions as to the relative value of the two careers. If a man became a member of Parliament his life tended day by day to lose its individuality, if he became a city councillor or an alderman it did not. _he tremendous quantity of talk which Went on in the House of Commons was in reality only carried on by a comparatively tew members, "and the man who went up to the House, unless he had some ever-binfag or brilliant capacity, must be content to walk through endless lobbies to the dictates of individual whips, and not to express any opinion which might collide in the slightest degree with the authorised organs of his party, and however much he might wish to express arguments which had led him to support this party, he must as a rule possess his soul in silence." Lord Rosebery remarked that he formed these opinions from his observations from the gallery, but some of his audience must have remembered that not so long ago he was the leader of the Liberal party, and therefore night be looked upon as having a closer knowledge of the methods of party pehtiefl than he pretended to have. Be went on to ask what attraction there was for a man to leave his country home and spend the best months of the Jf»*r "in the inglorious capacity of a voting maohine." The case ol a town •wncillor he regarded as immeasurably a»redignified and useful. "He could see "» work grow under his own hand, and by tie end of a year there were few active men, to corporations who could not see with their *&«», and touch with their hands, some Practical piece of work achieved in that J*ar, to which many members of Parliament would look with envy and hunger." There » » good deal of truth in Lord Rosebery's •fument— aud a good deal of sophistry. We *»bt if the possession of "over-shin- *•€ or brilliant capacity,' is essential "•fore a man can be a useful member of the House of Commons. If it is, the business of the country must be carried on by a mere handful of men. On the other hand it was but right that the "Ksre-wng dignity of the municipal career should have been recognised by one who had assisted in the government of London. With all that Lord Rosebery said on this point we can heartily agree—the jarring note is, as we have indicated, his comparison of the value of individual political and municipal Work, and in drawing that oomparison we thai! probably do him no injustice in saying that he knew his audience. At the same time his words must have brought balm to »na_y a bailie and town councillor who had *m«-<K*_eroUy wooed the parliamentary *-_rage_ of his fellow townsmen. • Now that the people of Model Christchurch are possessors Yachting, of a suitable piece of water, in the Bhape of Victoria Lake, the sport of miniature yacht sailing

should nourish. W T ith the exception of an occasional race at Lyttelton, under conditions necessarily unfavourable to public interest, this form of amusement has a novelty in Canterbury. For this reason, many from sheer ignorance are inclined to look upon model sailing as scarcely worthy serious consideration as a sport except for youngsters. Nor is it easy to realise, except by personal observation, the interest and excitement with which hundreds, aud in some instances thousands, of people in England witness the competitions of the mosquito fleet, say at the Round Pond in Kensington Gardens or on the Serpentine. There the models themselves are in many instances triumphs of scientific skill. By means of nice adjustment of weights, springs and tackles, the balance of power between helm and sails is so skilfully adapted to the force and direction of the breeze that the yachts will keep to a given course, either on or off t_« wind, and will even turn to windward. The boats are classed, or rated, in some cases by a system of computation of load lifce and sail area, and others simply by the number of inches of length; but whatever be the Handicap, it is possible to obtain a large parcentage of close and exciting finishes. Towards the end of the An season of 1896 a Christchurch Engrossing resident had an opportunityHobby, of seeing the interior of the Clubhouses of the Kensington Model Yacht Club and also one or two others. The large collection of various craft, with their histories and performances, was explained by the President of the firstnamed Club, Colonel Tupman (who, by the way, was in charge of the first Transit of Venus expedition sent to New Zealand). There could be no keener interest taken by the enthusiasts of any branch of sport in their hobby than was shown by these model yachtsmen, many of whom were well known and distinguished in their various callings. In many instances considerable sums are spent on the boats, and apparently absurd prices given to professional builders, but this is exceptional, and one of the best features of this amusement lies in the fact that the keenest enthusiasts are in nearly every case the designers, and in most cases the constructors, of their own " Valkyries" and " Defenders." The scope for ingenuity afforded by the variations of rig, build, ftc, best adapted to local conditions and weather, is immense. No one need despise model sailing. He may not care for it himself—plenty of people see nothing in cricket or golf—but every fair-minded man should encourage a form of recreation which at least is healthy, harmless and inexpensive. There are many amateur sailing men in Christchurch, and with proper management and organisation there should be no difficulty in forming one or more model yacht clubs, having tho new lake for their headquarters. This done, the pastime would develope and popularise itself. Most of us got keen pleasure in past days from some humble form of naval architecture, if it were only a Sax stick with a newspaper sail. Are we so much wiser and happier now that we cannot sympathise with such tastes still ? Tastes, too, which may" be of practical value in the encouragement of ingenuity and observation, and adaptation of natural laws.