DUNEDIN GOSSIP.

Cromwell Argus, Volume XXVI, Issue 1323, 28 August 1894, Page 5

DUNEDIN GOSSIP.

FROM OUR OWS CORRKSI’OXDKST Dunedin, August 24. What shall we do with our boys ! is becoming a serious question with those who have families growing up. Every avenue is crowded with eager applicants, and in the present depressed state of trade it seems impossible to procure anything like wages when work is found. Employers at present absolutely 7 decline to take on apprentices, until at anyrate they 7 know exactly what their liability is to be under the threatened Master and Apprentice legislation. Many of the young men with a little capital are leaving our shores for Coolgardie and other places on the Australian Continent. With diminished incomes housewives are seeking the cheapest shops. Here is to some extent, at anyrate, to be found one cause for the dulness of trade. Cheapness is a two-edged sword. Bankrupt stocks are being placed on the market at prices for which the goods could not be manufactured anywhere, to the great detriment of solvent traders. Other so-called keen business men by a system they have made their own, are offering ostensibly cheap goods, and drawing away custom from more scrupulous tradesmen. Take such things as soap and candles for instance. A special bar of soap is manufactured of less than the ordinary weight. The trader is able to sell it cheaper, and the undiscerning housewife is gratified at being able to get it 2d cheaper. She quPe overlooks the fact that it is deficient in weight. A bar of soap is a bar of soap to her. It is the same with candles. The smart man sells six candles as a lb, whereas it would take fully eight to make the lb. The old fashioned trader whose six candles are a lb in weight is simply not in it. With a decreasing trade the genuine trader finds it necessary to decrease the number of employees. This action and reaction are so patent in some trades that the wonder is that the general public fail to notice its working, and put an end to the cutting business. The demonstration of the Women’s Franchise League to celebrate the political emancipation of women was in some respects a success, it would be more so if the ladies would only throw oft their allegiance to the men whom they 7 invite, and depend upon themselves for the speeches. Of course there are dissensions, and there is a possibility that there might be a little smart skirmishing if they were to do all the speaking themselves. But that might do good. There is one thing that the ladies might study 7, and that is to avoid language which to the unregenerate conveys a double meaning, “To the pure all things are pure,” and possibly Mrs Yates, and for that matter one or two of the male speakers may be incapable of seeing how easily a second and not unnatural meaning may be taken from their sentences. At any rate the papers did not venture to reproduce the exact words, fearing, no doubt, that the courser male mind would only see in them something to chuckle over, and to be retailed as the latest blue story. The prosecutions in the court, of Hanlon for using false trade marks, has rather opened the eyes of the public who believe in patent medicines. The forgeries were of a most impudent description, even the English Government stamp having been closely imitated. This is a serious offence, and possibly further steps will be taken to discover the printer of these forgeries. The cases showed what a surprising profit is made by the patentees of medicine, and it is no wonder they are able to spend £IOO,OOO a year in advertising, and then make handsome fortunes. Why those who buy 7 these patent medicines are actually swallowing gold, so trilling is the value of the component articles as compared with the price charged. It is the heavy duty on such articles which, no doubt, induced the persons concerned to go into the fraud. But protectionists would like a still heavier duty, and as there is a prospect of obtaining something from the present Government, our protection league has been suddenly galvanised into life. One of its leading members is a pill maker, and doubtless the disclosures of the huge profits made by others have acted as an incentive to action.

The few observant persons who have noted the doings of the Social Reform Association have not been too favorably impressed thereby. The association was founded it may be remembered after the Revs. Gibb and Saunders had caused some sensation by detailing from the pulpit the results of the investigation of their private detective. Its first public appearance was as prosecutor in a charge of selling indecent literature brought against an unfortunate barber. The said literature consisted merely of an advertisement printed in a paper and to prosecute a man for such an offence without warning him before hand was nothing to boast of. The association then declared that the police in Dunedin were in a most disorganised condition and for this Col. Hume has snubbed them. The next move is likely to be directed against Mr Fish should he seek re-election as mayor. Now whatever faults Mr Fish may have been guilty of in the past, nothing can be brought against his administration during the past year and it seems hardly creditable that an association managed mainly by clergymen should continue to prosecute a man all his life. It is quite certain that no nominee of the association will display the business grasp or exhibit the energy of Mr Fish as mayor.