TELEPHONE CHARGES.

Press, Volume XLVIII, Issue 14349, 8 May 1912, Page 8

TELEPHONE CHARGES.

lt is curious that the sudden increase in the charges for what may bo called long-distance telephones should come about f-o early in the official career of n new Postmaster-General who has expressed such a keen desire to extend tho benefits of tho telephone system beyond the towns. "So far as cost is ' concerned," Mr Ell told a Porirua audience some days ago, "we aro very " much in tho position that to were in " many years ago, but tho efforts of '' my principal officers ace being directed "to means whereby the cost of lines "in remote districts can bo reduced " without- sacrificing efficiency/ Unfortunately since tho Minister spoke- a. large number of telephone subscribers havo found that "so far as cost, is '• concerned," they arc not at nil in the position they were in years go, but a go-cat deal worse off, while the satisfaction they will feel at the prospect of settlers in remote districts being ablo to sccuro cheap telephone communication will bo dashed by tho knowledge thnt for themselves the cost of telephono communication is soaring in sympathy with tho • increase in tho price of almost everything else. Country residents who havo hitherto been connected by telephone with Christehurch wiU, in some cases, find the ospejnse under the new scheme altogether too groat. A man living twenty miles out will think twice before he accepts an increase of ! 117 a year on the charge that he already pays, which possibly amounts to some £10, and his resentment at. this surtax will be all the greater because j it- has been sprung upon him without ! the lonst warning in the middle of a 1 quacter. At least- t'nc r>epartment might have given subscribers notice of ! its intention to raise tho rales. j We do not say that the subscribers since 1897 should be on any better footing than those who had to pay for their i own installations, but there is no doubt j that the Department's action has called attention to tho necessity for a thorough reorganisation of tho telephono system on scientific lines. In tho prei sent case, Lyttelton is especially badly j treated. The business relations between. I the city and the port aro so close that j one might expect every means would bo adopted by tin- Government to facilitate communication. But as a matter of fact, apart from the heavy rentals charged to Lyttelton subscribers, tho telephone facilities with tho port are extremely poor. During the timo it is available, tho trunk or bureau line j is greatly congested, with the re-ult that it is often quicker to telegraph to Lyttelton than to v« 0 the t-'ophone, while cases hare happened in which it was found better to go down to Port by train than to wait for the telephono to be disengagvd. Lyttelton'p first telephonic need is an increase in the means of communicating with Christehurch, • and vice-versa. The service notv is es-

pensive and unsatisfactory, and pla* , -- n further handicap on the transacion o> business hot ween the city and its l* r>, _ , i

It is niausinpc to nott> what comfort I tlio members of tho Played-out Vn* l >' j serin to dorivo trow tho parrot f> , ' ?■«.•]rented olio- more by Mr Fov. ;<!s. tlK't j tlio last oliftion was merely "a revolt J against. the" existing Government. !, ' it ' I did not indicate that the country had ; a desire for Mr Masscy to takecharco.' i We admit that tho verdict was not as ■ decisive as was to bo desired, but *>■"> j far as the country indicated it.s prefer- J enco for any loader at all. it certainly j gave its votes for Mr Mas.soy. It dis- ! tinctly showed no desire tor Mr Fowkls j and the New Evangel, for Mr FowMs | failed to got a seat, and wo can recall j no other candidate who i:ot in as \ a follower of Mr Fowlds. Tin: elections ■ showed emphatically that, the country j was tired ol .Sir Joseph Ward and tl' o I remnants left of his Cabinet. The only other leader before the country was Mr Mnssey, who was returned at tho j head of tlio largest party in the. Iluu.-e. having ir.ado a very substantial pain on his position at the previous election. Had all the members kept their pledges ho would have carried his vote of no-confidence. and wo have not the slightest doubt that he v. oultl be Prime Minister to-day. Oil" thing is quite certain, the country never iravo the •■lightest indication that it desired the lion. Thomas Mackenzie to bo its Prime Minister. Such a weird contingency, in fact, never once entered into its calculations. Bishop (Yossloy'.s remarks on the sul>ject of what is to come "after death," raises a question which has naturally been of the deepest interest to man throughout tho age.s. His lordship's sermon will not cause the sensation which would have been produced had it been delivered by a Uishop, say, live and twenty years ago. l)r. Farrar in his sermons on "Eternal Hope," prepared the way for a brooder unci kindlier conception of man's lot in the hereafter than that sketched out for him in tho older and sterner schools of theology.

Xocclless to s;iy iv« do not propose to on tor into tho discussion of a doctrinal question of this kind, especially when, in tlu; absence of positive information on tho subject, there is such a wide divergence of views. It iu;iy bo inter- ' estint; to remark, however, that .'Dr. t Alfred Ernest Gnrvie, Principal of Now College. Ilnmpstem], tho writer of tho article on "Eschatology" in the new "Kncyclopaxlia. Uritnnnica," after settiny out tho various ( views which havo been expressed re_arding tho Parousia of Christ, nnd Life after Death, sums up ns follows:—''The Fourth Gospel interprets both Judgment and Resurrection spiritually- Accordingly, tho VjenernL Resurrection and the Last Judgment may be regarded as tho temporal and local form of thought to expressi the universal and permanent truths that life survives death in the completeness of its necessary organs and essential functions, and that tho choice of that continued life is determined by personal choice of submission or antagonism to God's nurposo of graco in. Christ, the perfect realisation of which ;s the Christian's hopo for himself, mankind, and the world."

Perhaps the latest publication dealing with this subject is an imaginative work written by A. C. Benson, entitled "A Child of the Dawn," just published. Wo have not seen tho ■work itself, but judging by tho review in "Tlio Times" it is a little disappointing to those who, like, ourselves, aro admirers of Mr Benson's chastened, prvnsivo stylo of writing. His gontlri philosophy, touched as it is "with a tender flush peotic feeling, seems exactly fitted to give us something of that ! glimpse behind the veil" for -which wo aro all longing. Wo gather that his ■i.'.-aven is not in tho stage at which wo see it, a placo of final and perfect joy. It is only a period in the long succession of lives on earth and elsewhere which each soul must pass through on its way towards somo final absorption into tho God-hoad, and is a plaoo 'of rest followed by new toil in which tho spirit gets, or gets back, a knowledge, of tho true values which life in tho body has obscured. There is unrest there, and suffering, and jomething which might bo called sin. His hell is described as "a charming reposeful place of satisfied desiro where everyone is very well bred, exquisite, and gracious, until anything happens to sh6w how much a matter of pretence is its apparent serenity." When wo come to details wo find that Mr Bons'on fails us, and is simply scrappy. It is another instanco of tho folly of attempting to describe tho indescribable, and of trying to imagino that which eyo hath not seen nor hath ear heard.

Two points as to the ftittiro which M*r Benson brings out are, however, worth pondering over. The most evil spirits in nil this future life of his were on earth "men who havo lived virtuous lives nnd have dono cruel things from good motives. Thcro are. some kings and statesmen among them, but they aro mostly priosts and schoolmasters, I imagine—people with high ideals, of course." Authority, ambition, intolerance, respectability, learning without feeling—all the qualities that get people on in tho ivorld and keep society together—theso aro tho things that need the most purging beforo tho spirit is fit to begin a new life on earth; while inanv of those whom conventional morality holds tho worst of sinners find themselves taught through ; happiness. The solo virtue is love; J thu solo vice the lack of love. Mr I IJcusou's latest book may disappoint us j from an artistic point of view,,, but it is evident that in it, as in all his works, there is inspiration for those who are willing to rise in thought above the material pursuits which engross so much of our earthly life. Comment has been made more than or.co »n the way in which New Zpalanders are scattered all over tho world, many of them occupying positions which are evidence of tho good training which the Dominion offers in many branches, as well as of the ability and enterprise of tho young men themselves. Among these farY.andered colonials, graduates of the Otago iScliool of Mines occupy a definite place. Tho latest report by Proiefsor Park, director of that valuable institution, contains a list of the mere important appointments obtained last year by graduates. One is mill superintendent in a mining company at Cobalt, in Canada, another is pytrologist to tho Geological Survey of West Australia, a third is Government Inspec-

tor.of Mine, in the Malay States, a iourtli j s m j no surveyor on the Goid j Coast of West Africa, a fifth is a mine j j manager on the Upper Congo, a sixth ' Jis engineer of a mining company in I I Bolivia, an< } a cvcn th is with the j .ilawson expedition in the Antarctic. • A good list for ouo year, ospecialiv j wlien it, : S considered that in the same j (year the O:ag<> .School also supplied! j tho Director of the New Zealand Geoi Survey, tho Directors of tho j J Scnools of Minos at Karangahake, ; Ueeftou. and Coroinandel, and tilled a I number of other appointment?, both | publii: and private.

! 1 Lntil a few weeks ago a link mi- j j !i!lOWn to many people in this province I existed between Canterbury and thy j Church of St. Mary-le-liow', in ChoapI .side. London, for tho rector of that j historical church was the Rev. A. W. j Ilutton. a younger brother of the lato Citptain F. \V. Hutton. Mr Hutton. whose death at tho age of sixty-four is j referred to at length by many London j papers, hail had a somewhat remarkably oareor, for three years after ho succeeded hLs father as rector of hi* native parish in Lincolnshire, ho came under tho magnetic influence of Cardinal Newman, who received him into the Church of Rome at the Oratory in Birmingham. There he stayed for seven years, the confidential friend and secretary of Newman until the latter died in 188:3. A few years later Mr Hutton, who was an intimate friend of Mr Gladstone, became librarian of the Gladstone Library at the National Liberal Club, lie visited Now Zealand in ISflil, and two years later rejoined the Church of England, his appointments to St. Margaret's, Westminster, and- to Bow Church, coming in quick succession. Ono prominent paper, referring to his changes of faith, describes him as a man of the most sensitive conscience, whose, sincerity no one ever questioned for one moment. Like his brother, whoso death was such a heavy losr, to science in Now Zealand, tho Rev. Mr Hutton was possessed of great intellectual gifts, and ho became notod as a. preacher and aji indefatigable church worker. London owes to his fostering caro many improvements in his historic church, and especially the restoration of the old peal of "Bow Bells."