Page 16 Advertisements Column 1

Press, Volume LXVII, Issue 20413, 7 December 1931, Page 16

AUCTIONS. 11. MATSON AND CO. (Extract from the "Overseas Daily Mail.") A.D. 419 A.D. 1031. HISTORY'S WARNING. (By Viscount 'liothermere.) ONE of the most comfortable and current illusions of tho British race is the ide.i that our national affairs always come right in tho end. Catch-phrases embodying this conviction are the commonplaces of conversation on political or economic subjects: "We shall muddlo through somehow," says the inan-in-the-streot, or: "England always loses every battle except the last," or. in his moments of discpuragement: • un, well, it'll last out my time." Up to a point such confidenco is undoubtedly a source of strength. In a crisis it keeps the public mind freo from panic. But lias this buoyant belief any basis in fact % Does our national experience conilrui the assumption that the mero passage of time will always rescuo lis from .'i emergency arid carry us steadily on to better things'! If most of us had not given up reading history when we left school, fewer people would cberish the fallacy that Britain s fortunes have had nn uninterrupted record of progrossivo improvement from A.L' 1 . Ito A.D. 1931. There have been crises in our past which we have completely failed to ' muddle through." This country has known long eras of peace and prosperity that have ended in desolation and decay. England has never known so prolonged a period of settled government as during the three and three-quarter centuries when she formed part of the Roman Empire. Between the conquest of Britain under the Emperor Claudius in the middle of the first century A.D. and the withdrawal of tho last of the legions in the year 419 our country enjoyed a 1 degree of civilisation and security such as she never knew again till modern times, This is a span of history as great as that which separates the days of_ Elizabeth from those of George V. During all that time the people of this island shared to the full in the material and intellectual advantages of Roman civilisation. PROUD ROMAN BRITONS. Few people realise how refined and agreeable conditions of lifo in Roman Britain were. Elementary history books givo toe impression that the early Britons were a repressed and resentful race kept in subjection by a Roman garrison. Wo remember tue rebellion of Boadicea and forget the many generations of uninterrupted peace in which it was an interlude. Modern research is constantly finding fresli proof that the Britons quickly became Romanised. They adopted the Roman language and Roman dress, and were proud of their Roman citizenship. The legions that held the Wall of Hadrian against the Picls and Scots, or garrisoned the great fortresses at Caerleon and Chester, on the frontier of Wales, were largely recruited in Britain. The soldiers brought here from other parts of the Empire married British wives and brought) up their families to regard this country as their home. By the time the -wise and peaceful Roman administration ended, the .population of the country had risen to a level which it did not reach again for a thousand years. Rich Britons travelled to Rome, where British fashions at one time became so popular that the Roman ladies used to dye their hair golden in emulation of their fair M»i> '"oJTesent-day'prido in. British institutions and trad i tfone, and our conviction o their permanen.ee, had their exact parallel anions? thoßo ancestors of ours. Like ub they boasted ot their skill in craftsmanship British builders and artisans were famous throughout Europe. The country" export trade in tt»rn and tin and dyestuffg was active and rnrofitable. Then, ,i „„ w well-dressed people in every civi lised city insisted on having -British cloth t0 TV, e the Britons who lived for all those centuHeV^nder to the "stable and sure protection of Rome, thetr lished civilisation must havo see firmly rooted as our own appears to-d»y. One can imagine a Roman Briton of the fourth century taking a stroll alo "S banks of the Thames, perhaps at the very spot where this artiole is printed, and 0 plaeently comparing the conditions . own country with those pf the regions that lay outside the Roman Empire.

NOW "WE HAVE THE ELECTION OVER, LET US GET DOWN TO business. H. MATSOJ* and CO. offer their scrvicea. They undertake the salo 01 LAND WOOL LIVE STOCK GRAIN and PRODUCE end undertake INSURANCE of all kinds. and generally* conduct the business -of a Stock and Station Firm. II _you have business to transact, H..MATSON and CO. will be pleased to have a share ol it. LONDON. Before"his ■"eyeaIjwould 1 jwould be lying the galleys that cairied on a regular trade between London and the Continent. A little further downstream, behind a eity wall o£ such enduring masonry as only Romans knew how to build, he could see the roofs of London, regarded- even by him a*«n ancient City, ■with its well-kept, well-policed streets and markets, if* libraries, public b(*h«, Government offices and barracks, and It* richly furnUhed stone bouses, equipped with central heating as. efficient a# our own. Along the well-paved highway leading to what we still call the Great West Road would be passing chariot* and horse-litters, carry, ins rich Londoners to their eoantry,homes at Bath or Gloucester, and other traveller* •would be crossing London Bridge on their way to the Continent by Dover, <?r going to spend a seaside holiday at Folkestone. AN established SYSTEM. And this Londoner of Rowan times would reflect that wherever he chose to go m England, whether by Watling etreet to the NorthWest, by Ermin street to Lincoln end York, by the Icknield 'Way into East Anglia, or down Stane street towards Selsey Dill, he would find everywhere a system of law and order administered by the traditi.on ot many generations; that convenient inns and travelling facUiUes would simplify his journey; and that he would be constantly passing prosperous farms and coming upon market towns equipped with schools, hospitals, post offices, and places of entertainment. Looking back over the centuries that all these things had existed, he might well have Baid what many people are saying to-days What can upset a system so long and well established) Yet, as we all know, the British civilisation of that day was even then on the eve of being blotted out. From the year A.D. 419, when the last legion was called away to defend Rome itself against the attacks of the barbarians, the darkness that descended upon Britain was so complete that her history practically cease* for another four hundred years. RUIN AND DECAY. All the settled institutions that had grown ■up under Roman influence fell into decay. The prosperous towns were ravaged and burnt by Saxon invadeds. The great roads became overgrown. The arts of metal-working,, jewellery, and weaving, for which Britain had been famous, were entirely lost. The country sank once more into the savagery of warring tribes, and the only traces that survived of the cultured, comfortable lives the Roman Britons,had led were the mosaio floors which are occasionally unearthed from beneath the surface of a now lonely countryside, and the beautiful ornaments sometimes dredged up from the beds of British rivers. It -frould be foolish to deny the possibility of a parallel between those far-off days and the present time. Though history seldom re- - peats itself in detail, its is continually doing so in principle. The Roman-British civilisation fell when the force upholding it was withdrawn. The British civilisation of to-day is In danger for the same reason. Our institutions which appear so durable aro as completely dependent upon National Solvency as were the institutions of that earlier age upon the 'short swords and broad shields of the Roman legionaries. MODERN EXTRAVAGANCE. There will be no hope for Britain if her .defence of National Solvency is broken down. We owe the high standard of living which is our pride solely to the fact that in the past •we were a prosperous yet prudent nation, and lived within our means. It is menaced now because, despite our economic depression, we have become recklessly extravagant. I.repeot to-day what I have been stating ■ I'UPlicly for twelve years past—that unions 1 J?™®" 1 ": achieve* national solvency and establishes it upon sn enduring basis, catastrophe will overtake her as swiftly and completely as befell the Britain of Roman days. S'or year* we have been living beyond our means. We have ail but broken the back of Bwtjsa industry by excessive.taxation. Successive Government* have practised squan«ermani» aa if It wer® the supreme function of statesmanship. Each Party in turn has deÜberateljr pandered to the moat selfish inter. eSte of the electorate. Politicians and public alike have turned a deaf ear to all warnings and now at last the inevitable day of rccokniny hns come. This general election brings ns the last .chance that we shall get to inmid tli<> folly i uf W iv«s. KOTHEKAIEJvE.