NOTES AND COMMENTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXVII, Issue 11534, 20 November 1900, Page 4

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

Trials for lese-majeste continue to be unpleasantly common in Germany, no fewer than five occurring in two days, the most important being that of Herr Harden, editor of the magazine Zukunst, who was sentenced to six months' incarceration in a fortress for criticising the Kaiser's "' no quarter" speech in terms of disapproval. The Vossische Zeitung, " in referring to vhese numerous cases, remarks :"We read in the newspapers to-day that a street porter in Marburg has been sente«ed to six months' imprisonment for insulting the Empress, that in Hamburg a workman has been sentenced to five months' imprisonment for lese-majeste, and that in Beuthen a workman has been sentenced to a year's imprison** ment for lese-majeste, and that in Dusseldorf a man who is deaf and dumb has been sentenced to four months' imprisonment for the same offence. The prosecutions for lese-majeste are multiplying at an alarming rate. We must emphatically repeat that such proceedings appear to us to be in the last degree unsuited to promote the principles of Monarchy. . . . The more active and energetic the intervention of a Sovereign in the daily events of politics, the more fie inmpresses the stamp of his will on the management of the State, the more intelligible and inevitable is it that criticism should frequently be directed towards him. If this were not the case it would be more injurious than the expression of an unfavourable opinion. For it would be equivalent to a refusal to admit that the Imperial declarations have the importance which in all circumstances attaches to them. . . . The greater the number of political prosecutions that are instituted, the more accustomed, under force of circumstances, does the press become to the practice of writing so that the reader may read between the lines. And this attitude is to the advantage neither of public morals nor of the Throne. . . . We regret in particular that the case of yesterday (that of Herr Harden) was tried in camera. ... It has justly been said that publicity is more indispensable in political trials than in prosecutions against thieves and murderers. Publicity protects not only the accused, but also the prosecutor and the judge. Many a prosecu- { tion for lese-majeste would be obviated if leading statesmen would emphasise their own responsibility for the policy of the Empire and the State more strongly than has of late been customary, and thus divert criticism towards themselves. It there is no prospect of an improvement in this respect the Reichstag will have to devote its

serious attention to tie question how the present administration of jttitlce is to be dealt J with not only In the interest of freedom of speech and of the press, but also for the good of the Crown and the Well-being of the State." _^_______

The late Marquis of Bute was a scholar and somewhat of a recluse by temperament. He was rather shy and averse fn.m speaking, and took no active part in politics, in which he ranked as a Conservative. In some departments —in ecclesiology, for example, and in Byzantine art and history he was a recognised authority. On the latter subject, a few years ago, he gave a charming address before the Hellenic Society. Unfortunately he has not lived to see the completion in the Byzantine style of the new Roman Catholic Cathedral in London. His principal contributions to literature were "The Coptic Morning Service for the Lord's Day, translated into English," " The Early Days of Sir William Wallace," a lecture delivered at Paisley, in 1876; the " Burning of the Barns of Ayr," 1878. the "Altars of St. Columba." "The Roman Breviary, translated out of Latin into English," and the " Arms of Royal and Parliamentary Burghs in Scotland," which appeared in 1897. Lord Bute was, however, an active and efficient man of affairs. His main attention was given, naturally, to the development of the Glamorganshire property, and in the hearing of an application before Vice-Chancellor Bacon in 1884, it appeared that upwards of a million, mainly oat of income, had been spent in the improvement of the canal, docks, and harbours at Cardiff. Lord Bute paid a great deal of ; attention to the cultivation of the vine in | England, and is understood even to have made wine-making profitable. He was among the first of great peers to undertake municipal office, and was mayor of Cardiff in 1890-91. Education and learning, both in —where he was president of the University College of Cardiff in Scotland, found in him a munificent supporter. To the University of Glasgow he gave a large hall, and to St. Andrew'* £20,000. Both Edinburgh and Glasgow conferred upon him an honorary LL.D., and he served two three years' terms of office as Lord Rector of St. Andrew's. Professor Lewis Campbell and Mr. John Morley declined to be nominated in competition with so generous a benefactor, and Lord Bute was in 1892 appointed Lord Rector without opposition a thing without precedent since 1859. Among many other claims to distinction the noble lord was the possessor of a haunted house, Rothesay Castle. He was a keen investigator of supposed psychological phenomena, and it was he who a few years ago rented Ballechin House, Perthshire, for the purpose of endeavouring to determine whether there was anything in the persistent stories of spiritual manifestations taking place there. Of these experiments Lord Bute wrote an account.

" Some very remarkable experiments, which seem "destined to signalise the beginning of a new era in telephony, were recently conducted in Paris," says a writer in the October number of the Windsor Magazine. " About a hundred guests assembled in the garden of the official residence of the UnderSecretary of State for Posts and Telegraphs, were enabled to hear songs and speeches transmitted by telephone from a room one hundred and fifty yards away, the voices being reproduced without any perceptible loss of volumi. This remarkable result was obtained with a telephone invented by M. Germain, an official of the Department. This invention is considered likely to effect such a revolution in telephone communication that the French authorities have ordered an exhaustive trial of the new instrument, with a view to its general adoption. The new system, however, possesses such manifest advantages for long-distance communications that its general adoption can only be a matter of time. The day is not far distant when the Manchester manufacturer will be able to converse with his agent in Berlin as easily as the Capel Court operator now gives his orders to his broker on the Paris Bourse. Theoretically, the use of powerful currents should make it possible to establish telephone communication between Europe and America, but the difficulty and expense attendant on laying a suitable cable stand in the way. M. Germain, however, by no means despairs of overcoming the obstacle. His microphone has already given birth to a ' micro-transmitter,' which acts as a loud-speaking telephone over 2500 miles. ' Early in 1899 the writer was present at some experiments with the Germain telephone on an artificial circuit having the same resistance (1600 ohms) as the telephone line between London and Paris. With the small desk-receiver the voice was clearly audible in every part of a large room. With a tubular receiver eight feet long, passing through the wall of the house, the voice was distinctly audible fifteen yards from the mouth of the receiver in the open air. After so severe a test as this, there is nothing incredible in M. Germain's claim to be able to transmit sound of any kind, and reproduce it two hundred and fifty miles away before an audience of two thousand people assembled in any hall of first-class acoustic properties."