NOTES OF THE DAY.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1029, 19 January 1911, Page 4

NOTES OF THE DAY.

The Prime Minister,.in his ofli-' cial capacity as Minister for Defence, will, we trust,' enlighten the public as to the circumstances connected with the Cabinet authorisation of £100, which, we understand, has been handed to Captain Seddon, Staff Officer to tho Adjutant and Quartermaster-General of tho Forces, for distribution among those members of the clerical staff of the Defence Department who are stated to have como in for some extra work in connection with the recent appointments. It had been our impression—we may have been wrong —that the clerical branch at General Headquarters would have been able to copc with this extra work without such overstrain on the part of certain of its members as the payment of this bonus would seem to indicate. It has even been suggested in some quarters that this branch is at present over-staffed. However that may be, wc suggest that the Phime Minister might state: (l) Whether it is a fact that this payment bas been decided upon; (-2), if so, why, when so many months elapsed between the date whereon applications for these positions/were in-

vitcd and that upon which the final selection was made, there should have been imposed upon the clerical branch an excess of work which seemed to justify tho payment; (3), what rule is to govern the distribution of this remarkable bonus.

Glakcikg through the latest available English newspapers, we ar'e visited by a sudden pity for the non-political person. /Such a person does exist even in the midst of violent election contests like that which was raging last.month in Britain. He exists, but ho suffers. Turning over his favourite newspaper—tho -11 an cluster Guardian, let us suppose —he finds one broad page after another devoted to the speeches of candidates. He prudently shuns the editorials and letters, but when he examines the London correspondence, the'telegrams from foreign capitals, the money article, the law reports, the advertisements, he finds that the same trail is over them all. He comes at last to peer mistrustfully even at the book reviews and the' births, marriages, and deaths. But he has one haven of refuge—small, but (so he tells himself) secure. A paragraph headed "A Country Diary"-is'an old and valued feature of tho Manchester Guardian. It is always there. "Exigencies of space" severe enough to cause its omission are inconceivable. Certainly no election' could crowd it out. Perhaps a firstclass revolution might; no one knows. To this two-inch oasis in the desert of declamation, the weary one betakes Himself. He rejoices to learn that three kinds of tits have been distinguished in a 'garden at Denton, and that a "batrachian" (most people would call it frog) has awakened from its winter sleep in tho diarist's garden. He reads with approval that it will be "wise to look out for goosanders." Jibe and counter jibe about "American dollars" are happily forgotten in the pleasure with which he finds it proved that certain unfavourable opinions on the conduct of _ Sires f/ir/as are "not altogether fair" to' that insect.. But all this is. too, good to last. The diary for December 8 begins as though ft would describe some passing misfortune of "the wingless females of the winter moths," but in the second sentence the loiig-dclayed blow falls ; the'serpent of politics rear 3 its head even in. tho Eden of the "Country Diary."

Strong lights, shining late through the uncurtained windows of committee-rooms, often through the rich colouring of posters, are an attraction, .to tho slow-flying males,' which are spending their time wandering about the glass or fluttering through the open doors into tho lights, instead of seeking their wives. It is not only man whoso ciuiet home life is interfered with, by a winter general election. Yet there are those'who think that suffering fellow mortals, like the faithful, reader of the "Country. Diary," should be fined for not taking enough interest in politics to go to the polls.

The OhristchurcK Press lias been discussing, the results of the examinations for the Junior University and Senior National Scholarships, and it has made a discovery that should be of special interest to the educationists in this island. Of the thirty places, twenty-four are filled by candidates from the ■ South Island. The Auckland Grammar School secured four scholarships, and the only 'other North Island institution represented in the list of winners is AVellington College, whose candidates fill the seventeenth and twenty-seventh places. The list was headed by a boy from the Waitaki Boys' High Scho'ol, which divides up the" twenty-four successes of the South with the secondary schools in Rangiora, Timaru v : Christchurch, . Duncdin, Invercargill,: and Nelson. conclusion of tho.Prcss is that "the results as a whole "that, ; whatever progress :the North is making in*'other respects,. this part of the Dominion, in, fulfilment of its traditions, is more than holding its own in the matter of scholarship. That is a modest enough commentary upon the figures, which are four to one in favour of the South, but.no general conclusion of a more emphatic sort could bo drawn from the results in any particular year. At the same time, since the examination is still, as it has always been, a real test of the secondary school teaching in New Zealand, it would almost appear that the teaching is better, upon the whole, in the Southern schools than in the schools in this island, or that the scholars are brighter and more teachable.