RANDOM NOTES

Dominion, Volume 24, Issue 137, 6 March 1931, Page 8

RANDOM NOTES

Sidelights on Current Events LOCAL AND GENERAL (By Kickshaws.) Mr. Forbes is hopeful of a decided fall in the cost of living. His next problem will be what to do when M breaks its neck. y • • * A historian has discovered that th* first newspapers were printed on on* side of the paper only. Out' of deference to those who sit opposite reader# in public vehicles a generous Press ultimately decided to print on both sides. • « • A publicity expert declares that no commodity can get into the public eye unless it be well advertised. Small flies, sand, and eyelashes have evidently learnt a thing or two about the art of advertising. ■» • • Mr. Ramsay MacDonald complains very bitterly of his first introduction to London. "I remember perfectly well arriving at King's Cross without a hand being held out to welcome me and to convince me that I had not left the community of human beings entirely.” But for the fact, however, that Mr. MacDonald found no welcoming hand in London, he would never have become Prime Minister of England. He was guided toward his destiny not by comforts, but by hardships. Many a man is a better man to-day because he found his own feet Let us see how the curious twists and turns of destiny were arranging matters for the present Prime Minister of England. His early life was passed In poverty at Lossiemouth. He was looked after by his grandmother. A local watchmaker, dying of consumption, gave him books to read. He became a pupil teacher at his own school. He left Lossiemouth eventually to become secretary to a prominent social reformer in Bristol. He and the reformer disagreed, for already Mr. MacDonald was half a Socialist

When he returned to Lossiemouth Mr. MacDonald found an offer of a job in London waiting for him and went there. When he arrived in London he discovered that he had been misled. There was no job. Moreover his total wealth consisted of three shillings. Pride stopped him going back to Lossiemouth a second time. He stayed on haunting the boards where jobs were advertised. Eventually he found a job licking envelopes for the newly-formed Cyclists’ Touring Club. From that’he went to a 12/6 a week job. Half the night was spent studying to become a teacher of science. That then was Mr. MacDonald’s ambition —to be a teacher of science. This is where destiny stepped in to make him Prime Minister. Working into the night till three in the morning and. rising at six to start his day’s work made him fall ill just before an important examination. He never became a teacher of science. He became Instead, after convalescence, secretary to a Liberal member of Parliament at £25 a year. It was not long afterward that he blossomed into a candidate himself, as Independent Labour member for Southampton. Tho election itself is of little except that it gave him a wife in the niece of Lord Kelvin. Before she died she taught her husband to face opposition, unpopularity, and difficulties without swerving from his goal. I 1928 the guest of honour at tjje jubi of the Cyclists’ Touring Club was their one-time stamp-licker—the Right Honourable Ramsay MacDonald, P.C., M.P.

• It may come as a surprise to some people when they read that the mere readjustment of agreementsjoncerning salt could have made even Mr. Gandhi happy. It is just surprising to realise that prior to the successive reductions in the salt tax, starting in 1903, that commodity, next to land, contributed the largest share to the revenues of India. At the moment salt is taxed in India at the rate of only one farthing a pound. Salt is obtained in India apart from the sea border, from the salt lakes of Rajputana and by quarrying in the Punjab. It is difficult to realise the craving for salt that arises in countries where is absolutely no natural salt, A recent “Talkie” actually showed natives of Africa eating salt by the mouthful. This craving is so great that most of the oldest trade routes of the world were pioneered to tap rich salt deposits.

• « t The oldest trade routes of the Sahara wound their burning ways into the desert to tap the rich salt deposits of inland oases. The overland route to India was originally a salt route. Distance was no object where salt whs concerned. To this very day in remote districts on the West Coast or Africa many a dusky monarch relies for his revenue almost entirely upon a tax on salt imported from hundreds of miles in the Sahara—a tax adjusted incidentally to the maximum his subjects will* tolerate. In some cases where well known trade routes converge insignificant savage villages owe their existence entirely to levying tribute on all the salt that passes through from the interior. Salt has in fact played a part of the .utmost importance in fashioning the past communications of the world. One of the oldest roads in Italy is still known as the Via Salaria because it was once a famous salt route.

The importance of salt in early time? may be had from the fact that our present word “salary” is derived from just common salt. Roman soldiers were once given an allowance of salt instead of money. The Latin word for this ivas “Salarium.” meaning “Salt money.” Among many oriental people to this very day any meal containing salt is looked upon as sacred in character. Moreover in the olden days social rank was shown by one’s position in relation -to the salt at the table. Even China successfully raised loaus on her million a year salt tax revenues some three yehrs ago. Numerous wars owe their real origins, not their official origins, to high taxes on salt. The French Revolution was partly due to the government trying to make an unbearable monopoly out of suit taxes. Many a flourishing town owes its prosperity to no more than common salt. But for the fact that holes dug in the ground round Palmyra always filled with brine which subsequently evaporated into salt, that c.ty would never have risen above a tenth rate collection of medieval hovels of no earthly value to anybody—lf indeed it had ever existed at alh Let us therefore reverently cast spilt salt three times over our left shoulder —for it Is of more value than gold in many parts of the world.