SCOTT BASE’S FUTURE

Press, Volume XCVI, Issue 28415, 23 October 1957, Page 14

SCOTT BASE’S FUTURE

No Decision Yet

(New Zealand Press Association) WELLINGTON. October 22.

No decision on the long-term future of Scott Base has yet been taken, according to a statement released this afternoon by the Prime Minister (Mr Holyoake). The base will, however, be occupied for at least another 18 months.

In considering the base’s future aftep that time, the Government will take into account international developments and the results achieved by scientists during the International Geophysical Year. The statement added that the Government would decide the future of the base at the appropriate time. It was contemplated that the base would be occupied for approximately another 18 months, first by Sir Edmund Hillary’s Antarctic expedition, and later by the New Zealand party taking part in the International Geophysical Year. ‘‘Sir Edmund Hillary has begun his major task in the New Zealand expedition, the long trek south to meet the British party which is crossing the Antarctic continent,” Mr Holyoake said. ‘‘He will bring this party back 'o Scott Base and the two expeditions will then return to New Zealand.

‘‘New Zealand is making a very substantial contribution to the International Geophysical Year observance, which will occupy all next year. We expect it may be March, 1959, before the last of this party, which will be quartered at Scott Base, is withdrawn.”

RESEARCH INTO NOVEL

Jane Austen Character

An inconsistency in the behaviour of one character in a novel led Miss Sadie Balkind. senior English mistress at Christchurch Girls* High School, to several years’ research into the book and the author. Miss Balkind spoke last evening to the English Association of Canterbury on Jane Austen’s novel “Persuasion.”

The character of Mrs Smith in the novel was a widow, crippled and desperately poor, who turned from a spirited and cheerful person into a villainess, said Miss Balkind. In her advice to the heroine she broke completely the code of human friendship. “Her behaviour is inconsistent with the gentle irony of Jane Austen and the novel appears to have a dual ending. The final chapter is emotional and totally unlike the general pattern of hei books. “I discovered that the novel was written while Jane Austen was suffering from a form of anaemia and was dying. She concealed most of her illness and continued writing. “It is characteristic of progressive anaemia that there is general fatigue and that the mental condition is affected. I believe that this personal illness had its result on the character of Mrs Smith.”