TOPICS OF THE DAY.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXVI, Issue 14167, 15 September 1906, Page 13

TOPICS OF THE DAY.

1 J>HE END OP THE DREYFUS ... . CASE. rFxoM On» Cokeespondext.] LONDON, July 27. I suppose that if “ I’affaire Dreyfus” had been enacted on the , boards of a theatre instead of in real life plenty of \ people would have scouted, it as the rankest melodrama. Which only goes to show that the despised melodrama, with all its thrills and crudity of colouring, may sometimes bo truer to life than its critics ever imagine. Last Saturday saw the curtain rung down upon a happy ending to the long-drawn-cut romance and tragedy of Alfred' Dreyfus. 'After long yeans of suffering and undeserved disgrace, Dreyfus has been freed by the French Court of Cassation of tho infamous charges ■ brought against him,' has been re-ad-mitted to the army, .promoted to the rank of Major, and made a Knight of the Legion of Honour: arid on Saturday, in the presence of the troops, the new Knight received his decoration at the self-eame Ecole Militaire where in January, 1395, he had been so unjustly degraded. x Picture the dramatic scene—the troops paraded; in the barrack equate, Major Dreyfus in the foreground, dressed in a new artillery uniform, and standing motionless as a statue. Close by axe his wife and son and daughter, and a little group of faithful friends, including Anatole France and General Pioquart. Alfred Dreyfus as still motionless, and looking straight before him when Brigadier-General Gillain enters the courtyard in full uniform, .with cocked hat and plumes, reviews the lines of troops rapidly, then walks to the centre of the courtyard. He has given a quick look towards tho group, pointed out by an aide-de-camp with his drawn sword, in which Alfred Dreyfus stands, like a statue. The major is keeping _a steady, iron grip over hie own emotions. He hes extraordinary command of himself, but it is a violent effort of will. Every nerve is strained in the stiff figure holding tight the dyawn. sword. He will require prodigious self-restraint not to break down a few minutes hence, when the grey-haired general will pin the Cross of the Legion of Honour on ■his ooat.

Dead silence and everyone present (says the Pans correspondent of tho “ Daily Telegraph ’) is anguished with ©motion, and some pr© trembling.' Memories go back to that grey and cold morning of January 6, 1895, when a general’s voice said, in iron accents, “In the name of the French people, Alfred Dreyfus, you have been found unworthy to bear uniform,” when the capain’s stripes were torn off his sleeves, and his sword was broken in two, and, in the disgrace of his degraded regimentals, ' lie was marched past the troops, crying, “ I am innocent. Vive la France!” then to the journalist*' present, .when ho caught sight of themj “You will tell all the world I am Innocent.” How the fiTan now to be honoured must he thinking of that cruel scene! Small wonder he has to strain his nerves , into statuesque rigidity not to break down. A general’s voice rings out, but this time, to say: “In the name of the President of tho Republic, and by virtue of the' powers on me conferred, Major Dreyfus, I make you Knight of the Legion of Honour.” The Cross ia pinned on the still figure’s breast, the waneral dube jUfred Dreyfus Knight of the Legion with his drawn sword, then the grey-haired head bends, and one sees the white moustache just touch the cheeks of ( the new Knight, who is grey-headed, too. On© cannot see whether the iron-willed man’s face is giving way at last to emotion, hut tho figure is still motionless. Another, trumpet call, and another command. The general stands with Major Dreyfus and. Major Targe, now a pace behind him. The troops wheel about and march past thair commander and the new officer and Knight of the Legion of Honour. The simple military Ceremony is over. “I bav’o stood,” eaya the “Standard” correspondent, “ in a square to watch a man hear hia death sentence read. I have looked by the light of a candle at a dear friend lying wrapped in a blanket in tie shallow grave; but the one deserved hi* fate, and the other had met death honourably, and neither soon© moved me like yesterday’s short ceremony. Tire sotting was a common barrack square, whitewashed, stables on two sides, kitchens and offices on the '•others. Low-lying clouds hung like a Srey pall. There was no wind, . a silence eep as death. . The man standing in the square had suffered more than death. He had. been in purgatory for twelve yean?, and this was his.resurrection to life. For nearly half an hour he was as one in a trance, hearing no word spoken to him, taking no notice of words of command as the troops stood at ease or were brought to .attention. Even when _ the croea of honour was pinned on/his breast he made no sign, It needed his son’s Voice to call him back to existence. They, I think, th® most unconvinced anti-Dreyfusara present—and some there were—felt a lump in his throat.” A MUCH-MARHIBD MARQUIS. A public inquiry into the mental condition of the unhappy young Marquis Townehend is proceeding _ this Week. Qommeot on tho evidence is not permissible until the case is closed, but the evidence speaks for itself in the light it throws upon the Marquis’ “ manage da oonvenance.” _ In June, 1905, at the tiino when his income had dteuniahed almost to vanishing point, IheMan mis is stated to have written to a clerk in Somerset House, named Dunne, as follows:—“In consideration ot your introducing me to Miss Gladys Butheret with «/ view bo marriage, end tyn ocairideTataton. that such introduction, •ball be the means of my marrying Miss Gladys Suthersb, 1 promise to pay you ■lO par cent of whatever sum of money I receive from Mi- Suthenst or from any fbembar of hia family as soon as such aim is paid to me, which must b® paid before the actual marriage is effected, iti without such money I could not either merry or undertake to pay such bqaamiesiofa to you or anyone else.— Yours truly, Towrehend.” 1 Marriiwpe settlements were drawn up between the marquis and the family of Miss Suthea'6t. Mr Suthemt, who is i barrister by profession, agreed to advance or to saouro the advance of yfeJfjOOO to the the marquilß agreed to charge his life interest fn the estates op security for the advance. Purthejj it was agreed that if a son' was born Mr SutheJrst would reth© fcn'6oohis charge on the es-

Dates and settle it ,on his daughter. To talk about such an agreement being a provident agreement, said counsel lor the 'Official Bolicitor, was to waste words on it . It was an agreement which nobody who -had got; the _ ordinary powers of managing his affairs would be likely to enter into, aud it was significant that at the time these agreements were entered into there was no one to advieo tile niarquis ill & legal sense. The marriage did not take place until August 9, but on August 7 Miss Sutherst was found signing documents as “Gladys Town she nd.’ Coining nest to what h©_ described as “the most remarkable fact of all, ’ counsel said that Mr Sutherst, who had put his signature to documents which made hint responsible for nearly £30,000, was a bankrupt. He had been adjudicated years before, and had never obtained his discharge. Presumably he bad no means, or ho would have paid his creditors. That was the end of the first chapter. On August 9 the marriage took place, and the Marquis “passed away into the custody of Mr Sutherst and his family.” How the Marquis fared as a married man is indicated in bis letters. Writing to a clerical friend he said; “ You are certain to find that, before long, I shall go mad. The curse is that I have made a rotten, bad marriage. My heart is dead so far as she is concerned.” A little later he wrote: “Her company—her very presence—is gall and bitterness to me, just as is that of her unscrupulous mother. I wish I oouid have married some poor person’s daughter, but now I am done for life.” Speaking of his mother-in-law he wrote: “ She was the first to treat me not as a man, or even as a human being. She went so far as to hit me on my bead, which act was backed up by my wife. Coming down the church after marriage my wife refused to take my arm, remarking that we were only going to live as friends, and not as husband and wife.” -To his brother, Colonel Townshend, the Marquis wrote on September 10, 1905: “Dear Charles, —What induced me to marry Miss Sutherst was that her father was represented as being a barrister having a large amount of money, and being both waging and able to give me tho whereimhal to pay off various debts. I have, also been in hopes of having some assistance from your father-in-law. But as time was pressing I availed myself of what I thought was a grand chance. Mr Sutherst said what he Would do for me if I became engaged to his daughter.”

Tlie contention of the Official Solicitor is that the Marquis has been so badgered, worried and ill-used by selfappointed guardians that he has been rendered incapable of managing himself or his own affairs, and that it would bo to his advantage to be taken care of by any qualified gentleman who might be appointed by the Court. NEW ZEALAND BIRDS. Before his last illness Sir Walter Buller, whose death was announced this week, was able to complete a supplement to hi® well-known standard work on “ Birds of New Zealand,” and a subscription edition of the two new vol« umes has just been published. The first edition of “ Birds of New Zealand ” was published in 1872—thirty four years ago—and a second edition in 1888. Both editions have/ long , been out of print, but the present supplement, issued after a lapse of eighteen years, not only carries the subject up to date, but is virtually a monograph of th© orinthology of New Zealand and the neighbouring islands. Since the Eublication of the second edition of is book, the author diligently collected every scrap of information respecting the birds of tho New Zealand area that had appeared in print, and he liss incorporated all th© recent records of working naturalists, so that he leaves little to be recorded by th© historian of tho future. In this supplementary edition, Sir Walter Bullor writes strikingly upon the disastrous effect on the native birds of an indiscriminate introduction of foreign birds, such as the rook, the starling, and the housesparrow. 111-advised acclimatisation has hastened the extinction of some of the most interesting of the native species. To quote the author’s own words:— “ The. effect is to accelerate the threatened wiping out of an avifauna admitted to be ope of the most interesting in the world. : Many of the species have already disappeared; a still larger number are, so to speak, on, the borderland, and will ere long be extinct; whilst oven.the commonest species exhibit year by year a steady diminution in numbers. What the result will be in twenty years from tho present time it is not difficult to predict.” Again, ho prophesies the speedy extinction of tho beautiful wood-pigeon of New Zealand. A correspondent tells him that the weasels have become “extremely numerous in a certain district and are destroying th© woodpigeons wholesale.” As these birds roost low down, among scrubby bush, th© woasola climb up and attack them. In walking through the bush he haa constantly come across the remains of pigeons lying on tho ground, and, on examining those freshly killed, ho found that in every case they had been bitten in the neck so that th© blood might be sucked out, after which tho body was left, clearly . indicating the weasel's work. As regards the mischief don® by the introduction, of Wiese animals the author has much, to say:— “ New Zealand contains so many anomalous genera—so many types of ancient forms or connecting links with a fauna of the past—that its study is of tho highest interest to the philosophic naturalist. And what is happening at this moment P All the more interesting of these forms are passing away! Not a few species have already been exterminated. . . . Tho saddest part of it is that it seems hopeless now to arrest the evil. After much supine,neglect, the Government was at last,’ roused to take action, and by extending the provisions of the Wild Birds, Protection Act, it shielded, _ to some extent, species that were being indie-, criminately destroyed; but those most; in need of protection have become exposed to the deadliest of natural enemies by the introduction, at the instance of a former Government, of stoats, weasels and ferret®—bloodthirsty animals that are now. swarming over every part of the country, and defy all efforts to check their increase. The intention was, of course, to find some remedy for the wild-rabbit nuisance; but it is notorious that these* will not take fur when they

can gel; feather. From all parts of both islands I have received intelligence of the ravages of these animals, and, being now thoroughly ostablkhed in the country, it will be impossible evor to eradicate them. From a point of view 1 regard this act in the light of a- crime.”