The Price of Progress.

Press, Volume LVIII, Issue 17431, 17 April 1922, Page 6

The Price of Progress.

In the brief •span of which, covers the Ihistory of aviation, with its many wonderful achievements and its numerous tragedies, there has been no sadder occurrence than the fatal crash of Sir Ross Smith and his faithful henchman, Lieutenant J. M. Bennett. It was well said by an American paper that it is "the irony of the air that it will let a "flier do things seemingly impossible, "and then kill him when attempting a "trifle." Thus it was with Sir John; Alcock, -who, with Sir Arthur Brown, crossed the Atlantic in a' single bound of seventeen hours, and waa killed six months later by* his aeroplane striking a farmh6use in France in a fog. Thus it was with Mr Harry Hawker, who, attempting the trans-Atlantic flight, was forced to alight in mid-ocean and Was rescued by a passing steamer, met 'swiffc'deatin. last July when his aeroplane crashed at .Hendon. It was the, fate,

too, of Lieutenant Macintosh, the companion of young Ray Porer on Ins amazing eight months' journey from. England to Australia in a decrepit old aeroplane- The killing of Ross Smith and Bennett, two of the party of gallant Australians who in 1919 made the first flight of nearly 12,000 miles from England to Australia in twenty-three stages in just under 28 days, is surely the heaviest blow of all. To have met their fate after starting on their great attempt to fly round the world would hare been bad enough, but to be killed while making a short trial of the wonderful machine which embodied all the experience and knowledge and skill of the builders of the aeroplanes which, crossed the Atlantio and flew from England to Australia, was surely one of the sharpest strokes of tragedy. The sudden ending of two young lives already rich with achievement and full of promise for the future is a loss to Australia, which reared them, to the Empire, in whose service in war and peace they had done gallant deeds, and to the world, in which they were everywhere known as distinguished pioneers in aviation. Their names will always live in the history of man's fight for the. mastery of the air. That the fight is not yet won, the sudden end of Ross Smitih. and Bennett affords grim evidence, but it will go on. The stern necessity of war advanced the science of aviation amazingly in seven years, and it will become more exact and ever safer as the years of peace develop the aeroplane and its uses. We are not among those who regard recent airship disasters and the tragic deaths of men such as Alcock, Hawker, and Ross Smith as set-backs to the progress of aviation. The loss of these gallant lives is sad indeed, but the happenings that caused their deaths are milestones on the rood of progress. The toil of human lives taken by the sea is immense, but the development of the ship in man's fight for the mastery of the elements has brought us from tftie coracle, the galley, and the sailing 6hip to the 56,000-ton liner which can laugh at the worst gale that can blow. The eea will continue, nevertheless, to exact its toll, and so, too, will the air. For the air, while far more unstable, and possessing dangers the greater because they are invisible, is in many respects very like the sea. Of the air it may be said, as has been written of the Eea — fit knows no bond of plighted troth, " no fidelity to misfortune, to long com-" " panionship, to long devotion. Open "to all and faithful to none, it exer- " cises its fascination for the undoing of "the best." But the promise it holds out perpetually is very great.

Golf) says a contributor to a London, paper, is the pastime of diplomacy, and supports his contention by quoting the names of a few of the men who are or have been concerned in high politics. Chief among them, of course, is Lord Balfour—it will ,taken some time.to accustom us to a titled Mr Balfour—who did more than any man has ever done to popularise the 'game at Home. Previous to the middle eighties, we are assured by a chronicler of golf, it was the general belief that none but stupid people played it, but when Mr Balfour, having accepted the Chief Secretaryship of Ireland "at a time when Ireland was seething with murderous discontent," continued to play golf regularly, in spite of what one* must think was the disturbing companionship of a posse of guardian detectives, many a man was induced to take to tho links, on the principle that 'there must'be something in the game if a fellow like Arthur Balfour plays it.'" He was never a great golfer, "but as a partner in a foursome, he was invaluable, for he brought to the game that Original power of mind which was so priceless to him in the political game of rising to t/he occasion. You were generally safe, in his hands if at u critical stage in a match you left him with an agonising putt from a very doubtful distance." As most matches are won on the putting green this, as every experienced golfer will admit, was no light praise.

Another publio man who is said to be welcome as a partner in a match is Mr Lloyd George, for whom golf has an extraordinary fascination. Like many another, desire in his case outstrips performance, and erven James Braid, by assiduous coaching, has not been able to correct the many faults of tho Prime Minister's game. The keynote of his style, appears, we are told, to be—"l must hit the ball somehow and somewhere." As, however, ho cannot hit is very far it is usually found.on the fairway, which, as his critic says, is after all the main thing and one that a stronger partner desires more than anything else. The same writer suggests that Mr Lloyd George has pondered his action in many grave crises while playing golf. If this is so, one need seek no further for a reason of his poor game, -for it is one of golf's many charms that it demands a man's undivided attention. Possibly it was on this account that M. Briand, when Mr Lloyd George sought to initiate him in the" mysteries of golf during the Cannes Conference, imperilled the AngloFrench Entente by declaring, after half a round, that it was "a silly game." Mr Lloyd Goorge explained that the principal object of the game "is to make you walk," but this painfully weak attempt to find an excuse for a game that needs no justification, failed deservedly. "I do hot need to hit a little ball about in order to walk," remarked the, French Prime Minister severely. •'When I take a walk along the roads I could, if it amused me, just as well hit a little stone along with my stick. I could even change it and choose different-sized sticks to vary the pleasure. But this recreatioji seems very childish to me.'' That shortly after this, M. Briand should have found it necessary to resign, while Mr Lloyd George is still successfully weathering the storms of his exacting office will be recognised by all golfers, as just what might bo expected. ♦ With its annual show, now drawing half the State to Sydney, tho Royal Agricultural Society of Now South Wales celebrates its centenary. It won founded in Juiy, 1822, losing by some six months the distinction of being tho first society of its kind in Australasia> an honour which belongs to the Tasman-

ian Society. The life of the New South Wales Society has not been continuous. It died, first, about 1837, largely it is said because of the attitude of exclusion maintained by the "pure merinos" —the free settlers —towards the emancipist or ex-convict class Other societies were started, but each in, turn ceased to exist, until about the sixties, when the present society was formed, the first show being held in 1869. But there was a show, of a kind, in 1822. The society was not strong enough to run one on its own account, so it organised a lire stock side show of the Parramatta Pair, one of the events of the year in Sydney in those days, in which reproduced many of the features of the Old Country fairs. Prizes were given for numerous things which find no place on modern prize schedules. One shepherd received 32 dollars for having weaned 297 lambs out of a flock of 316 ewes, another was awarded 20 dollars for sixteen years' good service under one employer. A prize was offered for strong beer, which seems to have been heavy enough, judging by the Sydney "Gassette's" description ot its effects upon those who sampled it. Those were the days of coaching, and the attractiveness of the fair-cum-agricultural show may be imagined from the statement that two extra coaches left Castlereagh street for "a fair ground at Parramatta almost breaking down with their cargoes."

Every Minister has his own way of dealing with deputations* whether friendly, hostile, or merely, as is usually the case in New Zealand, merely "asking for more" money. Mr W. M. Hughes the other day, however, adopted a course which at one time or another most Ministers must have been tempted to pursue. A deputation representing unions connected with shipbuilding and ship-repairing industries, after mentioning that a considerable proportion of members of the unions were unemployed, asked that the whole of the work of repairing vessels of the Commonwealth Line should he carried out in Australia. Mr Hughes was entirely in favour of this being done and said he had given orders to that effect three months ago, though when repairs 'became necessary in a ship when she was in the English Channel or the Mediterranean she had, of course, to make for the nearest port. The deputation were inclined to argue that work was being done to tho ships unnecessarily in foreign ports, and eventually one speaker asserted that such repairs had been effected in India by black labour. That was the explosion point. "Black labour be d d," retorted Mr Hughes. "Go to blithering blazes 1 Don't talk to mo about black labour. I am against it." "But they have done it," said tho union official who had raised, the question. "I don't believe it for a moment," replied Mr Hughes. To the question, "Do you call us liars P" he /vouchsafed no reply but seizing his hat and stick departed, leaving the deputation busily engaged in supplying the newspaper men with instances in support of what they had said. The short way with deputations is not, after all, always the quickest wav of disposing of a grievance. But it must be an immense relief to an overworked Minister's feelings I