TOPICS OF THE DAY.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 25, 30 January 1912, Page 6

TOPICS OF THE DAY.

. Taumarunui's new membe!P> Mr. Wilson, is proving himself as The Burden keen a crusader for of the the backblooker as Mr. Backblocker. Jennings, whom he ousted. A special telegram in our news columns from, Auckland to-day gives details of backblock- hardships to move the hearts of city people, whose comfort and general welfare depend so much on the country industries, If the man on the land is hampered, he and his family suffer, but they do not suffer alone. The country is so much the worse off for the backblockers' inability to work the land as w«U as they are willing to do. Mt. Wilson refers to promises of roads to replace the almost impassable tracks in the wilderness to which hardy men and women have been lured, b_ut the fulfilment of the promises has been deferred till the- settlers, for all thftir stoutheartedness, are losing hope. In the ordinary course, reading should precede settlement, but "these men were content to I;ake up rough land, on an understanding that the roads would soon be made. They havo done their part. They have toiled manfully to win wild places to cultivation for the country's good, but the lack of roads puts a burden on them beyond their strength. Out of the ordinary politicians' sight, they have been out of mind. Parliament seemed to have grown hardened in recent years to the heart-rending reports from the backbiocks. The eloquence of Mr. Jennings generally fell on callous ears. It was a competition of one district with another for doles from the Treasury, and the backblockers, furthest away from the political hurly-burly, fared worst. We believe that brighter days will presently dawn for those forgotten pioneers, struggling desperately many miles away from the "amenities" of civilisation. Mr. Massey is committed to a policy of sanity in regard to 'backbiocks roading and settlement, and intelligent activity by his party in this matter must educate ' the whole Parliament to perceive the national importance of this rational work. When tho proposal for a University Chair of Domestic What Will She Science was first put Do With It? forward two or throe. yeaa's ago we gladly supported it, for we believed that the propei' honouring of this subject would benefit young women and the community. We imagined that women would be readily able to equip themselves for the higher housekeeping, and that domestic work would surely acquire that status of , dignity, to which it* importance in th»

social scheme entitles it. Time has changed the proposal into a resolution, and the Senate lias approved a course for the Degree of Domestic Science. Perusal of the syllabus of subjects (printed in The Post yesterday) must amaze and even stagger an average reader. A woman who qualified for such a degree would be weirdly out of place in an ordinary home. It would be a fate as incongruous as the exile of a Napoleon on a St. Helena, or the us© of a steam-hammer to crush a walnut. It is true that Mrs. "Mind," B.D.Sc, would be a living terror to anybody who tried to sell adulterated food, bad .soap, or cotten or woollen goods of a grade inferior to the labelled quality, provided she had the nerefißary laboratory attached to the kitchen, but generally much of her compound, complicated knowledge Would not be used in an ordinary home. The course is _ designed to turn out teaohers, analytical chemists, inspectors under the Pure Food Act, inspectors of nuisances, health inspectors, and suchlike. Of course, oue of tho objects may ! be to give women facilities to attend any particular course of lectures, leaving them, free to eschew tho degree, but if they yearn for the magic letters B.D.Sc. they musf be prepared to have their foreheads expanded with, a vast store of polysyllabic words. We should think he would bo a brave man who would marry a B.D.Sc, whose training would impel her to give him strictly technical meals, with scrupulous regard for the proteids, fats, and carbohydrates. "We believe that a working knowledge of these proteids, fats, and carbohydrates is valuable to any housewife, but' for the university degree this knowledge will be on a scale much beyond the requirements of workaday cookery. We do not fancy that there will be any rush of applicants for the arduous honours of B.D.Sc. Andrew Carnegie, now library magnate for the comfort "Triumphant of mendicant local Democracy." bodies (of which New Zealand lamentably has a few), wrote a book some years ago on "Triumphant Democracy." As a steel magnate at that time Mr. Carnegie was busily gathering from the democracy the millions of dollars which in alter years he was to dispense- to scattered portions of the world's democracy in the shape of bricks and mortar and stucco for library buildings. When Mr. Carnegie had less time for voicing platitudes and trite aphorisms than he has now, he was industriously exploiting that democracy which he was pleased to describe as triumphant. That triumph was more theoretical than practical in the days of the "Steel King s" domination. It was not till last year that th* Steel Corporation or Trust, which Mr. Carnegie helped to create, began to feel the_ hand of an awakened democracy. The suit which the Government brought against the United States Steel Corporation named Andrew Carnegie in company with Pierpont Morgan, John D. Rockefeller, Charles M. Schwab, and others. ■ "The part played by these men, and particularly hy Carnegie and Morgan, in the establishment of the trust," wrote The Post's San Francisco correspondent on Ist November last, "is very vigorously criticised in the Government's Bill. It is shown that by the watering of the stock Carnegie received in return for properties worth £64,000,--000 securities of the Value of £98,400,--000." Here was a nice margin for libraries, for the mendicant local bodies, stretching their cape across the five seas for a dole from the "sage- of Skibo Castle." A cable message to-day givessome 4iews of the triumphant part played by oertain lowly members of the democracy in making the Carnegie millions. It is cabled from New York that "a Department of Commerce report accuses the Steel Corporation of maintaining a system of labour as enslaving as the old-time galleys." The message mentions how the steel companies have developed a policy of employing hordes of aliens at killing hours for a pittance. It is years since the companies, began to shamefully exploit the ignorant immigrants from Europe. They were herded like animals in hovels, and their life was such as Dante has pictured foa lost souls in his "Inferno." They sweated by the roaring blast furnaces, a life- of t rinding toil, with intervals for sleep in Ithy dens. Carnegie can give away millions now for libraries, but he will never restore the brightness which the Steel Trust has blotted out of the lives of thousands of men. This offer of money for bricks and mortar for libraries for mendicant local bodies is meagre recompense for the deeds of the Steel Trust. We hope that New Zealand will see no more examples of local bodies degrading themselves by "cadging" for Carnegie doles.