CURRENT TOPICS.

King Country Chronicle, Volume XII, Issue 1221, 7 June 1919, Page 6

CURRENT TOPICS.

" A shadow is bf Ins; cast over the penero-domestic hearth Domestic which is the peculiar feaFires turo or British home Doomed. There are premonitory warnings that il may have In be abolished, because il leads lo great waste of coal." says tin* Dally Telegraph. "Sir Pugald Clerk, in a lecture before Ihe Society of Arts, proclaimed the advent of a new era. so far as heat, as well as light, is concerned. In his opinion, it is urgently necessary that drastic measures should be taken lo conserve the coal resources or Ihe United Kingdom. ' Our industrial civilisation to-day,' he remarked. ' is founded upon the use of coal deposits of this island; when our coal is exhausted, then our type of civilisation must change.' England, in short, must become not the workshop or the world, but one of its gardens, placid and beautiful. but poor, supporting a relatively small population on a standard of comfort far lower than that to which we have become accustomed. This radical change is not imminent, for Sir Dugald Clerk thinks that our coal measures might last for something approaching 20 years at the present rate of consumption."

It is sincerely lo be hoped thai the authors of Ihe dasTh« Outrage lardl)' outrage permt petraled at GrevOraymouth. motilh yesle rd a y morning will be run lw garth and receive due punishment for I heir cowardly crime. Apparently hiving a grudge against Senior-Ser-geant Simpson, they were prepared In gratify it by committing a triple murder. and without any consideration of the fad that it was not impossible that other innocent people might also suffer. We would Jike to believe lh.it the deed was the work of an irresponsible maniac, but il shows too much deliberation and premeditation to permit of that conclusion. It is evident that a large charge of explosive was tired by a time ruse, and the escape «-f the contemplated victims under the circumstances seems almost miraculous. Should the crime ever be sheeted home, it will possibly be round that the criminals are of those perverted men who regard society as their enemy, with a decided abhorrence of policemen. whom Ihey look upon with special detestation as the representative* of law and order. They profess to believe that Ihe whole »»r society as ft exists must be destroyed: religion, marriage, the home Ihe State, private property, education —all must be broken down as a prelude to a neworder lo be inaugurated and directed by them. What their regime would mean, the world has, al times, had awful evidence, and it is much to be regretted that the anarchistic spirit is widely in evidence at the present time. It is a world problem, and it is apparently spreading. There are exponents of it even in this favoured land: some or them are in high places, and they seek to "educate" the New Zealand workers in Ihe tenets of their creed. It will probably be shown that the dastardly outrage perpetrated at tireymoulh yesterday morning is but lhat creed in action, and that should be sufficient lo warn Ihe blind and the thoughtless as to whither they jre being led.

Thw Celebrations in Britain have been fixed for Au.«ust Simultaneous 3. 1 and an«l a competes plete programme li.ik Cfilebrations. b»«en drawn up. So far the Dominion Government has made no move to ensure that celebration* in New Zealand shall *vn»-[tr»>nise wilh those al Home. though w.» have little doubt that all will agree that such a step j«t ili-sifablf. H would be particularly impressive if the celebrations* throughout the British Knipirn were held simultaneously, and not in a piecemeal fashion. There can be no fpiestion that the dates fixed upon by the Imperial authorities are peculiarly signitlcant, as it was ua August that BriMfc made her great decision to enter the war. What belter dale could therefore be fixed for celebrating the conclusion of the Great Adventure tha* the anniversary of that upon which it was launched. It is sought to specially impress upon the minds of the children the significance of the great event. Would not the association of August i, 101-1. with August 'i, 1919, serve to that end?