A PEEP AT PALMERSTON.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLII, Issue 138, 12 June 1908, Page 7

A PEEP AT PALMERSTON.

(By Frank Morton.) j • This week, as I was about to write for ah American magazine an article ! on State-ownership of railways m New Zealand,%it was suggested to me that I ought to look at the private line at my door; so I journeyed up to Palmerston by the WellingtonManawatu. It was a delightful ride, despite the holiday crowd. Amusing, too: Going up, there was a lady m xay carriage whom I'm prepared to back against the world as a talker. She started at Wellington. There was a man with her. Two or three times in three hours I heard him say two or three words; but all the time the lady talked she made a colourable pretence of conversation. Now, that, if you- come to think of. it, was a truly wonderful performance. .If any mere man doubts me, let him try. Let him keep up a brisk pretence of conversation for three hours, and all the.time say nothing worth mentioning. As a feat of endurance, it merited attention; for the. lady talked in the top. of [her head, at the top of her voice. 'She was yards away from me, but over all the clatter of the train I could quite easily have taken a shorthand note of her oration. As a speed test, it would have been quite worth while. I can only suggest. " Did you see that stuff in tha English, paper The Wide World I think it was about a motor trip through New Zealand Said that j New Zealand roads were the worst in the world I never heard such nonsense in my life why look at this one I consider it an awful shame to go an' write things like that don't you so uncalled for I say that our roads are as good as any\ TJmP Oh yes you mean that thing of those Williamson people I think it is Very pretty charmin' Kipling's all right of course but one gets tired of Kiphn hes been writin' so long I like "The Upper Berth " best of his, Urn? Oh Marion Crawford is it I always do mix 'em up So awfully much alike don't you think ?"... And so on. Two hundred words a minute at least. Three hours; 36,000 words—a, bobk, Hies amis! I wonder how it's^done! But we got to Palmerston in the end, had lunch, and felt better. Now, what is one's first impression of Palmerston. Quaintly enough, I was struck first of all by the overpowering number of fried-fish shops. They lie alj along that street I don't know the name of, down there from the railway station; the odour of their industry steals insensibly into every cranny of your being. Why is it that the good Palmerstonians are such lovers of fish? Question for a specialist; I don't pretend to know. Then there are quite, a few hotels in Palmerston, and all seems to, be wellconducted and prosperous. I was there all through the briskest hours of a popular holiday, and I didn't come across a single inebriate, a thing unique in my Australasian experience, a thing I shall probably never see again. Quite apart from that, I liked Pelmerston. It _is so spacious and so placid. The delightful space in the centre of the town is an excellent testimonial to the sense and public spirit of whoever laid out the "town, Without these breathing-pr&ces <ho town: on earth was ever satisfactory, or in the true sense safe. Constant close besetment of crowding bricks-and-mor-tar induces a sort of psychic biliousness, a malignant squalour of the soul.' Palmerston will have none of it.. Up there, with the city open to every breeze that blows, the Palmerston folk have still avoided the menace of stuffy streets. And land is by no means cheap at Palmerston. I heard of £12 a foot paid recently for the site of some place—a technical school, I think it was. That splendid square in the middle must be worth_alot of money; but the people keep it inviolate, and do well. I don't know whether it's a usual thing, but Palmerston last Wednesday was full of bright young pirls^on horseback, all astride. One's eye becomes accustomed to the novelty, and it pleases. With divided skirts cut full, I cannot see that "there pan be any. suggestion of impropriety (though 1 am no authority on that sort of thing), and the improvement of the comfort and ease of the girls must be very great. We are gradually beginning to admit that woman is a biped, even in New Zealand; and that is a better sign of the times than some others I could name. Balmerston, ;then under that high arch of blue, with the sun just adequately warm and the breeze just pleasantly crisp and cool, delighted me; so that I was sorry to have to leave so soon. We ,don't get to these upland towns often enough, we denizens of the roaring metropolis or whatever you like to call it; and when, V8 do go we don't go in the right spirit, with the right intent. If you want to enjoy any place, it's a fatal mistake to go on business. You need to go care-free and in idleness, with nothing to do but lie back and let whatever may be good in the unfamiliar place soak in. Was it imagination, or does "one really get more courtesy from the officials of the Manawatu Railway than from the officials on Government lines? Mr Teece, the General Manager of the A.M.P. Society, some time ago assured me that he found the general discourtesy of railway servants in New Zealand positivelyappalling. He was referring to Government lines, and I am compelled to admit that what he said my own experience bore out. But on the Manawatu the officials were entirely courteous. The trains were crowded, and on holidays tliere is always much to tax the patience of railway men; but I. saw no impatience, and I heard no snappy demands or rejoinders. On one occasion when the collector came through I had mislaid my tickets, jmd had to keep the official waiting till I found them. It was a busy day,, and I had no excuse for my carelessness. On a Government line I should certainly have been snarled at. On the Manawatu the ticket-collector waited quite amiably. What causes the difference? It was noticeable in the dining-car. There was a big rush there, but the waiters were faultlessly patient and attentive. They are not always patient and attentive on Government lines. Why is it? Is it, as seems likely, that in some matters the State is a notably bad disciplinarian? It is a fact undoubted that in Government offices you cannot hope to find the tact and courtesy that all good private firms and institutions insist upon. Government offices everywhere are full of petty bureaucrats bursting with self-importance. I know that the rule is not without exception. In the Wellington Post Office and in the Tourist Department one meets with nothing but courtesy and helpfulness. Why should it not be so elsewhere? It i^ti't. Take the Treasury. If you ever have to get money from tho Treasury, and want to get it soon, abandon hope. In Australian States, 1 never had the slightest difficulty in getting a voucher through in a week,

und in Tasmania 1 have seen it done iv a day. In Wellington it takes a; I-month or two, and if you dare to mii quire about it before it crawls along, j you aro regarded with a cold eye of &uch displeasure as the Recording Angel might turn on an impenitent thief. It is a sort of unwritten law or tradition that the Treasury must not be bothered about anything* From week to v/eek, the officials there live lives of contemplative, unbroken calm. If it was their own money they handled, they could scarcely hand it over more slowly or with less apparent willingness. But let us get back to our railway. I enjoyed that ride very much-—even when allowance is made' for the voluble lady of the forenoon. And the statement that the line is shortly to be taken over by the Government gives me a twinge of pain. I dare say it's quite unreasonable and silly; but I can t help it. I am, you will perceive, no perfervid partisan of State-ownership. As a boy, I travelled a good deal, and enjoyed myself immensely, on great ; railways controlled by private enterprise. Fares vere wonderfully reasonable, and holiday excursion fares merely trifling. I travelled to London and back on. one occasion (300 miles) for ha!f-a-crown. I have a vivid recollection of the cordiality with which porters and guards cared for small boys on their summer travels. I flatly refuse to believe that the State could manage those lines half so well. Later, I went to ;md fro about the great private railways in India. necessary alluwance for inevitable natural advantages and nuisances, Indian railways are wonderfully well managed. When one is tired of sitting, one can lie down. When one decides where one will take tiffin, or whatever the • next meal may be, the guard telegraphs on, and the meal is waiting^ cooked and served in the nick cf time. The convenience of" the public .comes first- in all considerations, The comfort of the public is so well-considered that there is none of the wearisome overcrowding we see so often in New Zealand trains. If a business man wants to travel by night, he can do it, whereas jn New Zealand he has to waste his valuable day. I don't believe in State-ownership; and, judging by what I've seen of State-control generally, I wouldn't trust the State to wash a handkerchief for me, while there was privateenterprise at hand to do it. State administration is always wasteftil administration. In all departments there aro too many masters, and in many departments the man on top is not so trustworthy a man as any private enterprise would demand. I have known Ministers of Railways in Australasia who have been all sorts ot things, but I never yet heard of one wto happened to be an expert railway-man. It is, the same right through: A lawyer's clerk must know some law, but a minister of justice may bo a poultry-breeder or a retired sweep. There is no end to the humours of democracy. The principle is good, but democracy is a new growth, and in these early days of development, it sometimes grows dangerously askew.