NOTES OF THE DAY.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1648, 15 January 1913, Page 6

NOTES OF THE DAY.

The British Government's dwind ling majorities'on the Welsh Church Bill—and its obvious dependence or the goodwill of the Nationalists, whe eithei'icare nothing: about the Welsh Church or else object to ment, but who must keep the Government in office—-must give the Radio als cause for much uneasiness. The Government's abandonment of even the pretence of legislating in a reasonable' 'and regular. manner has shown itself, in many striking ways. Full discussion iii_ stifled, to begin with. , By the.betjinning of December, Clause 32 in the Home Rule: Bill was reached. The Bill had been discussed on 23 days. Of .'the'-clauscs passed, only 102 lines were discussed, and, 655-were closured and passed without any opportunity for discus- • sion. No fewer than 931amondmcnts were down for the 32 clauses, and -were'shut out'. With the guillotine 'forking, r ruthlessly; arid the (Nationalists, always" on 'hand .to Vote, for anything;the Gdvornmont wishes, Ministers nave oven begun to spare themselves the farce'of attendance..'At Kirkcaldy, Mr. Lloyd- . George actually, boasted of his .'rare attendance. . As Mr. .Walter Long pointed out, the absence of Ministers from the House had become so gross a scandal that'even. ; 'the /faithful Daily}-.Chronicle' felt" itself obliged to, ; protest. - "The '..'Government Bench,'- if; said, "too often in theso days presents a spectacle of painful attenuation." It is possible that somo of'the.Ministers, and somo { of the., rank and'- file;. are a little - disgusted by the undignified position of the Government, which is at the mercy of three minority parties—the Lloyd-George grpup, the Labour men, cand the/Nationalists. One cannot .blame '' tho Nationalists. ' They want Homo Rule, arid they aro entitled to Use every, effort to get it, But on. the Welsh Bill there must bo some sore Irish consciences. Several weeks ago tho Government was just saved by the Nationalists,' and the Daily Telegraph, made a pertinent observation! "The Government majority was 83. The Irish Nationalists, who—with half-a-dozen exceptions—had not heard a .iVordof tho debate, saved the situation once more. ' Were they; too, voting that ancient endowments, once belonging to-their co-religionists, should be'dcvoted to waShhouses 1 No, they were voting for Home Rule!", An interesting.and useful idea has just been approved by the Board of Governors of Christ's College, one of the excellent secondary schools in Christchurch. ■ The idea, which ,was presented to the board by the new headmaster, Mr. Belcher, is that there should bo some exchange of tea,chcrs between Christ's College on the one hand and Rugby and Clifton on tho other. As Mr; Belcher explained in the interview wo print in another column, the arrangement is part of a fascinating scheme originally propounded by Mr. E. B. Sargant, who was education adviser to in South Africa. Ono day, perhaps, there may be the Canadian Eton, the Australian ■row, tho New Zealand Clifton, the" South African Winchester,; that Mr. Sargant and^-his friends dreamed of, and W6. do not, think that Mr. Belcher's expectations of such a perfected scheme need be very heavily discounted. In the meantime, it .is sufficient to think of the largo practical value of the system with which Christ's College, is making a beginning. New Zealand and English schools: and schoolboys have much to learn from each other, and from tho viewpoint of mero efficiency in teaching and educational methods it would do advantageous if other Now Zealand grammar schools wcrd to follow tho example of Christ's College. Tho English committee through which the exchange between Chrisfs Collcgo and Clifton has been arranged, will welcome proposals from other colonial schools, and tho governors of our boys' colleges might consider whether they can try in the sphere of education that idea of intra-Impcrial exchange of which tho possibilities aro receiving the attention of tho various Governments. The anti-Reform newspaper in Christchurch is more than usually angry with us because, with somo correct enough statements in one of its articles as our text, we suggested that nothing could be moro natural than that Christchurch, the blot on the political state in the matter of Parliamentary representation, should

•o bo the blot oQ tho defence system. | l . "Christehurch," to quote its article ,! on the local working of tho defence ■o system, "must be afflicted by some it particularly troublcsomo disease." a We agreed, and tho Christehurch |f paper is very angry. It tells ttß now i- tlmt we were untruthful in oilr char<i itable suggestion that it was rather disgusted at the "anti-militarist" '- mischief in its city, Very well; let Us say it is not disgusted' at all. After saying our observations were rubbish," it proceeds to show a very j guilty conscience. It was not suggested by us—it did not quite occur to us—that tho Christehurch paper had really fostered, in its own way, t H 1 e , Christehurch opposition to the , Defence Act. ■ Wo remember J however, that it generally found, a way of escape for that opposition, and those politicians and others who led it. Accordingly, it appearß j to havo telegraphed to General Godley that it Bad been!insinuated, that it had been responsible for the dis- £ creditable, record of Christehurch; and it quotes a telegram it extracted , from Genekal Godley. The General j says: "If it has. been insinuated that' the Lyttelton Times has been " in any Way. responsible for any iinv satisfactory conditions that: defence J matters may be in in Canterbury, I do hot agree with that view." We j should like General Godley .to pubj lish tho telegram he received. No doubt ho acted with good intentions; but, as no "insinuation" of tho sort j was made at all, the General will j. perhaps realise that before being led into sending telegrams to angry " newspapers ho ought in-future to' s ' make sufficient inquiry to protect himself from being quoted as having r rebuked an "insinuation" that was not made; It is a little surprising that ho should havo' fallen into the " trap laid'for him. ) .;.: