TOPICS OF THE DAY.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 12933, 12 October 1907, Page 8

TOPICS OF THE DAY.

Thoro are people -jrho LeCritic 3 lieve that journalists are and Jo be -bought if they are Players, offered their price. Dramatic critics especially come under the suspicion of these cynics. The accomplished critic of the "Westminster Gaaette" tells of an interesting incident in this connection. He attended recently a meeting of the creditors of a brother critic, at which

one creditor kept making the suggestion thai the debtor should bo able to get something from his frieads wherewith to F°y his oneraiea. At len Sth ne epoke clearly. Ho suggested that as the debtor was still the critjo of au important paper, he should seek assistance from the leading managers, who -would, tho creditor was cure, advance him money -without expectation of direct repayment. This man of Irosiness evidently believed that dramatic critics nwdo more or leas of a practice of accepting bribes. A friend of the writer remarked to him the other day that he supposed the new society of dramatic critics had come connection with the coming into force of the Act for the abolition of secret commissions. Foreigners, judging, it is to be feared, English critics 'by some of those in their own countries, "presume that the London critics have itching palms. The "Westminster's" critic received not long ago a letter from a Continental actress about to <play in .London, stating that she would bo charmed if an advance articlo about her Mere published, and offering to pay any prico for it. Tho reply, referring her to the advertising manager, doubtless surprised her. It used to bo, and perhaps is still, tho custom for players and dramatists in Franco to call on the critics heforo or after a. first performance, and not long ago some French actresses visiting London sent their cards to the leading critics. "It has been said, no doubt untruly, that tho rate of pay of the critics of Paris is based in part upon the supposition that their post gives them collateral advantages. In England tho popular idea is, I fancy, that tho critics are paid vast sums by their editors and. also enjoy these little extras. This idea is possibly tho explanation of tho fact that editors sometimes got letters from people offering to act as dramatic critics without any salary at all." The fact is that London critics aro honest, and only in rare cases is an attempt made on their virtue. Sometimes such attempts are embarrassing. A very well-known critic onco received a preeent of game from a manager, and applied to Qiis editor, the late Sir John Robinson, for advice. Sir John's happy answer was that ho had better eat the birds promptly, in order that corruption might not be added to bribery. That various honourable Human witnesses, each eworn to Evidence, teil "tho wholo truth, end nothing but the truth," m»y yet givo wholly different accounts es to tho details of an accident or ft crime, ie a matter to surprise nobody who has studied tho laws of evidence enough to know with what regularity these differences occur. Tho unintentional mistakes of the normal mind have practically to bo allowed for in every court-rcom. How curiously inaccurate norma]) minds can be, has been tested lately by tho Professor of Psychology at Harvard, who experimented upon hie class of several hundred young men, with a view to establishing the exaot value of evidence upon questions of size, sound, and time. They had the advantage of not being taken by surprise, of having their attention, consciously directed to certain points, *md time given for quiet scrutiny. A sheet of cardboard was shown, on which fifty ■ black squares appeared in irregular order. After looking at this for five seconds, the students were to writ© down how many black epots that cardboard showed. "Answers varied between twenty-five and two hundred." "When a sheet contained only twenty spots, tho replies ran up to seventy and down to ten. '"Yet we should bo disinclined to believe in the sincerity of two witnesses, of whom ono fait sura that he saw two hundred persons in a hall in which tbo, other found only twenty-five." Next was judged the number of seconds whioh elapsed between two loud signals. When the right time was ten seconds, it dragged so much for some unfortunate students that many called it forty-nine, somo even sixty, though it "passed liko a flash" for the man who guessed threefourths of a. second J "Yet a district attorney hopes for a trustworthy reply when, ho enquires of a witneste, perhaps a cabman, how much . time passed by between tho shooting in the cab and a cry." Finally, when asked to watch and record accurately their instructor's doings, eighteen in a. hundred men absolutely failed to soo all sorts of actions performed before them with the left hand in their eagerness to keep account of his activities with tho 1 right. The psychologist, then, concludes that witnesses should be examined as to their capacity for observation beforo circumstantial evidence carries weight. But Pudd'nhead Wilson judged that accurate observetion itself has risks. "Take the case of any pencil sharpened by eny woman; if you hivo witnesses, you will find she- did it with a knife; but if you take simply the aspect of tho I>encil. you will fey eho did it her teeth." Though ho does not touch Canada's on the burning question of Races. tho influx of Asiatics, a Canadian contributor to tho "Pall Mall Gazette" has much that is interesting to tell us about race questions in tho Dominion. Tho elements are certainly varied. To begin with the nativo Indian, a fow generations will sco the last of the Red man. It is impossible to.mako him conform to civilisation. But ho will leavo a legacy to the remotest destinies of tho country. While tho French half-breed has too often gravitated towards tho moral and physical •weaknesses of the maternal lino, the fieotch half-breod, of whom little is heard out of Canada, is a very different typo. Tho offspring of old Hudson Bay factors and nativo women, have risen to high positions in Canadian affaire, and! contributed a valuable strain to Canadian nationality. The French Canadians were declared tho other day by Mr Harold Begbie to be a community absolutely distinct from the rest of the people, but the 'Tall Mall's" contributor thinks there has been an appreciable approximation of French and English. French parents realise that their children are handicapped in life by not knowing English, and as the Engleh do not speak French, |t is easy to see the result of this onesided procew. But it will tako generations to break down the barriers. There are regions of Ontario wihere the deaoendanta of Highland settlers still talk Qaelic. Canada has not to reckon with the negro, but the ha*

and Irish immigrants, *J J Ger l Finns, Greek., iXou. mans, Scandinavians, Italians, iwu nuiUx, Hindus, Chinese, and Jr** neee. Fortunatdy for Canada l be nomination from the Umted Kingdom for tho Erst half of tbo >^ r J™"** an increase of 35 per cent. Next to the immigrants from Home and tho Americans, public fooling seems to prefer the Scandinavian, the German, and tne Finn. According to this authority many of the settlers from tho United States aro really Britishers by birth or at only on© removal, for, strange as it may seem, thousands of tho eons of Ontario farmers took up land iv tho States not co very long ago. i'ho possibilities of the back country were not realised by the public any more than by the English Boundaiy Commissioner who, on finding that the Pacific salmon would not take the fly, decided that tho country was not worth bothering about.