CURRENT TOPICS.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CIX, Issue 13113, 29 April 1903, Page 6

CURRENT TOPICS.

The n Hen problem ini Great Britain, is being seriously discussed, and the discussion, is bound to ba beneficial, though .it may be doubted whether the Balfour Government will have the courage to propose reasonably restrictive legislation. A return of the number! of alien prisoners, so far as the authorities could ascertain, undergoing sentence or awaiting trial in England and Wales on March 2, was furnished to the House ol Commons last month by the Home Secretary. It. appears from this return that ore the date in question there were 625 criminal aliens in custody, namely, 176 Germans, 149 Russians and Poles, 54 French,. 44 Italians, 29 Norwegians, Swedes and Danes, 8 Dutch and 166 of other nationalities. Of these 563 were males and 57 females. The offences are returned as 223 against property without violence,, against property with violence, 98 against the person, 35 forgery and coining, and 147 other offences. The sentences were 102 to penal servitude for five years and over, 59 So penal servitude for less than five years, 111 to imprisonment with hard labour for one year or over, 93 to imprisonment with bard labour for sax months or less than onei year, 63 to imprisonment for three months and less than six, 67 to one month. and less than three months, 150 to imprisonment for less than a month or waiting trial. The cost to 'the British taxpayer of mainr tabling these criminal aliens in prison is not stated, but it amounts, at the very, lowest calculation, independently of the property stolen, the injuries inflicted, and the* police and legal expenses, to about £30,000 a year. The London journals.publisli* striking little incidents to illustrate the extent of the evil, and various mem, bers of Parliament seem determined that the question sliall nob be lost sight of by the Government. Sir Howard Vincent is particularly active in this direction. jVIr Forde Dudley, another “ anti-alien,” recently drew the attention of the Home Secretary to a statement by the Magistrate ol

THE ALIEN PEDDLEM.

tte Worship, Sheet Court, who declared that Ms Court was so occupied with aliens’ .wages disputes that British people could hot get their business done. To all ■question's on this subject the Government! replies that nothing can be done until the Boyail Commission reports.

■ battleships FOB'SALE.

Wo explained a few weeks ago the circumstances in. whicb certain Chilian and Argentine . warships came to ba' bffered for sale. There was a rumour at’ the time that the Admiralty ha d arranged l 'to'purchase the vessels, but Mr being questioned in the House of Commons, said that the matter had been “ carefully .considered by the Admiralty, and they have clearly come to the opinion that the’ ships which are for sale are. not! suitable for our purposes, and it would not be advisable to buy them.” The Navy / League, however, is not content with this reply, and is, pressing for a more definite statement of the reasons for which the Admiralty Idecllned to purchase. It certainly'appeared a good opportunity for a profitable investment. The two first-class battleships 1 built for the Chilian Government by‘Messrs Vickers and Messrs Armstrong- cost about £2,200,000, but they axe described as the most powerful vessels of ■their size afloat. 1 One of them, when armed, could discharge over 13 tons of projectiles a minute. They will be ready to / take their place in the fighting line a year hence, and in the interval it is expected that another modern battleship and two> first-class cruisers, built ifor the Argentine Government, will be on the market. The Navy League contends that the advisability of purchase does not rest entirely on the coat and suitability of the vessels. “The question is a very serious one for the taxpayers’of this country,” says the Secretary, in a letter addressed' to a London journal, “as, in the event of their being acquired by one .of. certain Powers, it w'onld immediately become necessary for this country to lay down three fresh keels, in. order to maintain her relative position ; and, judging from the present cost of our battleships, it would require about £4,000,000 sterling to maintain our lead over the purchasers of the Chilian ships. Moreover, as it takes three years to build a first-class battleship, we should remain) two years astern of our rivals.” / The League", as “ a body of laymen,” does not venture to say whether the Chilian ships are “of an ideal' typo for the British; Navy,” but- it views with anxiety the possibility of so formidable an armament passing into the hands of a foreign Power. This aspect of the question, docs not seem to have appealed to the Admiralty.

In our boyhood or girlhood days we were most of us fascinated by the stories of the old Norse Vikings who discovered and jcolonised Iceland and Greenland, and perhaps Labrador and the North Atlantic coast of America generally, centuries before Columbus was born. Professor J. Fischer, who has subjected the old sagas and legends to a searchingly critical examination, has recently published his conclusions. He appeals, so a writer in the “ Standard ” tells us, to ancient historians, maps and ruins, to show that Greenland, at any rate, was reached by Northmen in the tenth century, and their descendants remained till .late in the sixteenth., af . is first mentioned by Adam of Bremen, who took a great , interest in. mission work in the north about the date of the Norman Conquest of England. So anxious was he to obtain information, that he visited King Sven of Denmark, “in whose memory was engraved as on a tablet the whole history of the barbarians,” and received from him very many details, about this land beyond Thule. King Sven also told him of a more distant and gonial region, Wineland, so called from its wonderful’ wild vines and grapes, of which, also, ,we hear a good deal. The people, Adam learnt, were nominally Christians, and were anxious to receive missionaries. But independent, and not much later, testimony to the colonisation of Greenland is to be found in the writings of a learned Icelandic historian,' named Ari Thorgifeison, Who died just before the middle of the twelfth century. He obtained his information about Greenland mainly from a companion of the first discoverer of that country. This was one Eric, the Red, who set sail westward from Iceland and settled in Greenland, at the place now known as Erichsfiord, about the year 985 A.D. Ari also speaks of Wineland as well known, but inhabited by people in a low grade of civilisation. In addition to the evidence of old maps and documents, there are ruins, a monastery-, churches and dwellings, to prove that the Scandinavians had settled Greenland in the Middle Ages. They knew, also, “Wineland,” “Markland” and “ Helluland,” which presumably extended down the coast of the mainland as far ns Massachusetts. These countries do not eeem to have been seriously colonised.

BEFORE COLUMBUS.