NORTH-EAST VALLEY.

Evening Star, Issue 12875, 26 July 1906, Page 7

NORTH-EAST VALLEY.

heaval of that unhappy omtntry; England in the vajy near future has to face the problems of Egypt for the Egyptians, In* dia for tho Indiana, Africa for the Africans, not to speak of its own private skeleton in the cupboard—Socialism. Where do we stand amid the coming turmoil? L)o we present those verile traits that make for national prosperity? In the past, Nature and circumstance have favored our native land to such an extent that we have lost the power of appreciating our true position. Materialism—“the gospel of comfort,” at One of our seers has termed it—has darkened our eyes. Our educational system has bent the knee to Baal. We have worshipped the “system,” and the true manna of wisdom has remained ungathered. It is to such men as Dr King that we colonials must look up to as national benefactors, and his efforts to lead us to a more sane and rar tional view of life will probably be accepted and fully appreciated at ite true value before many years have passed by. Our whole educational system—primary, secondary, and university—must advance with the times. Dr King's work in connection with the necessity for mothers nursing their own children, the danger to children by the use of patent foods, the absolute crime of cramming the rising generation with barrow-loads of obsolete literary lumber, guaranteed in after* life to eradicate all originality and the true love for literary inquiry, deserve the warmest encouragement by the community. Recently, while riding in an electric car, I sat next to a High School boy. My mind running on “ cram,” I thought that an opportunity presented itself to know what “cram” and “literary lumber” were really like. Well, I found out in ten minutes, by scanning the High School boy's books, more facts of cram than Dr King had illustrated in some score of columns. Perhaps the rector of the Boys’ School might favor the public with a .-ketch of High School education; but pray do not address it to Dr King nor conch it in the form of language usually adopted by the Ratepayers’ Association towards Cr Brinsley. Personally, I would have liked Dr King to have pointed out that had some of the students mentioned by him been initiated into a knowledge of the simple laws of health there would not have been so many break-downs. Horace Mann illustrates this point very forcibly when writing to a young student friend he said: "I am certain that I could have performed twice the labor, both better and with greater ease to myself, had T known as much of the laws of health and life at twenty-one as I do now. In college I was taught all about the motions of the planets, as carefully as though They would have been in danger of getting off the track if I had not known how to trr.ee their orbits; but about my own organisation and the conditions indispensable to the healthful functions of my own body I was left in profound ignorance. The consequence was 1 broke down at the beginning of my second college year, and have never had a we 1 l day since. Whatever labor I have since been able to do I j have done it all on credit instead of capital I—a most ruinous way either in regard to health or money. For tho last twenty-five years, as far as it regards health, I have been put from day to day on my good behaviour, and during the whole of this period, as an Hibernian would say, if I had lived as other folks do for a month I should have died in a fortnight.” I could multiply similar remarks by other observers, but I think Horace Mann fills tho bill. It does certainly seem strange that in this year of our Lord, 1906, a country spends such an excessive amount on socalled education, and leaves its rising generation in such Egyptian darlmess. Our cows and hens get every possible attention that up-to-date science can suggest, but it stops with the animal and vegetable worlds. The necessity for reform has born fruit in Germany, and in a lesser degree in Prance, and also in the United States; but in so far as I am aware it has not come within the zone of active educational effort either in Great Britain or in any of her colonies. — I am, etc.. Colonial. July 22.

TO THE EDITOR. Sir,—ln reading your report of last Monday night’s meeting of the Borough Council, I noticed that they carried a motion to send the mayor and town clerk to Wellington to attend the Municipal Conference. Now, sir, in years past the M.H.R. for the district represented the Valley, and at no expense to the ratepayers. I think! Cr Betting and his supporters deserve credit for opposing the motion. What with a water scheme from Mount Cargill and electricity for lighting purposes from a private source, I am afraid the ratepayers will find themselves in a fine pickle before long. I hope a public meeting will be called in order to show some of Our councillors that they are returned to represent the views of the taxpayers.—l am, etc., Watchdog. Juy 26.