TOPICS OF THE DAY.

Evening Post, Volume LXXVI, Issue 112, 7 November 1908, Page 4

TOPICS OF THE DAY.

Germany's action in endeavouring, as it appears, to make Germany and the trivial Casablanca France. incident a pretext of quarrel with France, is possibly only a diplomatic ruse to divert German attention from the Kaiser's blundered interview. With eyes friu ned towards the old enemy, the German nation will have less time to worry over the trouble at home. Machiavellian rulers arrange things so; and some regard to the conclusions of "Tho Prince" must be paid by every discreet ruler. Or possibly from Casablanca there is a little credit to be snatched to weigh against the Kaiser's loss. Politics and life are inevitably conducted according to the theory of Maori mana or Indian medicine. The politician who loses his medicine — in Wellington North, for example— must find it again before he can be admitted to the society of congenial braves : the nation whose mana is tarnished ever so slightly must wipe the stain clear before it can hold up its head in the international assembly. One time-old way of recovering mana is to destroy somebody else's. If France were to eat humble pie, Germany would have a better digestion. It is difficult to believe, as Le Temps suggests, that Germany would go to war about Casablanca, while the Balkan situation is still so obscurej and while her own European situation is so unsatisfactory. Along the Danube troops and anna-, ments are piling vp — the Servia and Conference of Powers is Austria. still postponed — and for the first time in years we are asked to spell the ominous word Kraggyvats. Failure has the consolation that, as a local pundit assures us, in whatever way we spell it the Servians will find another way, with other throatrending collocations of consonantal vowels. Cragbuypwachzsx is the ancient capital of Servia ; and thither, over the mountains, the Servian war-chest has been carried, away from easy Belgrade, which An Austrian army, awfully arrayed, Boldly by battery besieged long alliterative years ago. It seems that another Austrian a,rmy ia entrenching itself and putting guns in position to repeat the process. "Cossack" commanders wilJ not on this occasion cannonading come, but Hungarian engineers may be found dealing destruction's devastating doom even more efficiently. A crisis, seems approaching ; but whether it will turn to peace or war they probably do not. know even at Belgrade. Prudent Servians certainly will not wish to risk war without Russian backing, and it is likely that a British embargo upon Russian backing will be maintained as long as possible. A peacemaker has been at Otira. Bishop Grimes, passing that The Bishop way, not only peeped in the Tunnel, at the tunnel, but went a thousand feet into the drive, and did not find it an inferno. He no doubt had opportunities to chat with the men and to notice whether anybody had been suffering from "saturnalia, of direst misery." He stated in Christchurch that " he found an excellent spirit prevailing among tho men, and that their relations with their employers appeared to be most cordial. The men appeared to him to make light of the recent troubles." This announcement comes in pleasant contrast with the dismal allegations of delegates at the Minors' Conference. Many persons have spoken bitterly against "the contractors, and portrayed the workers as men suffering the direst misery. Agitators at tho statue, even at the height of the unemployment boom a couple of months ago, cautioned the \ workers against going to Otira. There seemed to be an organised conspiracy against the contractors, but they were not men to give heed to the agitators or to alt-er their plans k> suit the whims of the very tired. Bishop Grimes holds no brief for the contractors, and ho is not a man eager to rush into print for the sake of having his name in tho papers. He is a calm, judicial critic, and his words now muet be accepted ns strong evidence to discount tho startling assertions that nave reached Wellington from time to time. Though the farcical element appears to predominate in the A Feminine latest exploit of the Mutiny. "suffragettes," recorded by cable to-day, tho incident has its serious side. The lawless women who aspire to be lawmakers have behaved outrageously in the streets, at political meetings, and outside the private residences of Ministers of the Crown, where they have sought to force an entrance. More than once they have created serious disturbances, not only in the precincts of Parliament, but in the galleries of the legislative chamber itself, obtaining admission by false pretences. As yet, they seem to have let places of worship alone; but, so far as political life is conce.-ned, it had begun to seem as if mere man would be driven, as King Solomon seems lo imply he was on occasion, to seek refuge in "the corner of a housetop." Again and again, proving contumacious, the ringlead&rs have been sent to prison as disturbers of the peace, and last Saturday, it seems, they turned refractory and organised a noisy mutiny in Holloway Gaol, with the result that the two Pankhursts — the ladies who made the recent hysteric display in court — have been subjected to the discipline of solitary confinement. It is a melancholy reflection that all the ringleaders are women of education and culture, and no better example could be given of the wide difference between two qualities too often confounded — knowledge and wisdom. They have not even the common-sense to see how grievously . they discredit their cause, and how effectively they are aiding their opponents. Imagine these ladies in Parliament ! Recognising no law but their own sweet wills, could they be expected to accept an adverse decision ? Perish tho thought ! There have been undignified scenes before now in the Commons, but imagination fails when it tries to contemplate a Parliameno which should count among its members a group of militant "suffragettes."

The drying of family linen before a fire in the dining-room was responsible for an outbreak of fire at 7.9 o'clock this morning, in a five-roomed house in Constable-street, occupied by Mr. James Davis, and owned by Mr. Robert Rich- j ards. The City Brigade was summoned, I but found on arrival that the outbreak had been subdued by the occupants, the damago being confined to some wearing apparel and the dining-room wallpaper. There was an insurance of £150 in the London and Lancashire Company on the hii'nitnre and an insurance of £450 in the Now Zealand Company on the houee.