ON THINGS IN ENERAL

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXVII, Issue 11541, 28 November 1900, Page 3

ON THINGS IN ENERAL

• I SIR ARTHUR SULLDpAND HIS FATHEB Dr. Thomas, in his intercig biographical sketch of the late Sir Art! Sullivan, mentioned that the overtureffn' Memoriam," as is generally known, is composed by Sullivan in memory of Mather. But the pathetic circumstances J«r which that work was produced arejss well known. When in 1866, that is wj he was 24 years old, and had a commissi to write for the Norwich Festival, Sullii could not find an appropriate subjectind said to his father, to whom he v. asjvotedly attached, " I have a mind to give! the whole affair, I don't know what to cise for a subject." " Don't do that, my bo] said the father ; "don't give it up, soijhing will happen that may furnish you 4 an opportunity." And three days aftertfds something did happen father sufcnly died. Half mad with grief, his scjfollowed the coffin to the grave, and wkepe came home and sat with his mother bWing over his loss, he suddenly jumped imnd said, " Mother, I can't bear it. I mu/crv out my grief in music." And there d then he sat down . and wrote. And thu? as the overture, "In Memoriam" created. When I knew Sullivan he was the mer st of men, his IrishItalian nature being i the sunniest character. Sullivan , was th a" great favourite With the ladies/ but 1 never married. His deceased brother lef a numerous family totally unprovided and the gifted composer most generous and liberally supported and brought tm up. IRELAND AD AFRICA. There is a ark-lose parallel in many respects between theebellion in Ireland of 1798, and the rebelJio'of the Cape Dutch in some parts of the cohy during the present war. Reading thepapers of a hundred years ago one might)e reading, with only an alteration of nam.', the .record of the doings on tie froitir districts of Cape Colony in February an March last. The famous Major-General Vench, reporting to the Lord Lieutenant of'reland in September, 1798, says x— " On \y arrival at BalHna, I found that the ton had been evacuated by the rebels, andwas occupied by the forces under Lord Lrtarlington. I marched without halting t<Killala, and my troops entered the town atone end as the rebels marched out at the Uier. Our advanced guard maintained a Wick and welldirected fire on the rebels, 'yho fled in all directions. ... I fe.td that the

Bishop had suffered from to rage of thb rebels, but was glad to findiim in safety, preserved from violence only by the influence the French Commandant Charust had iver them. . . . Having eard that the

rebels were assembling in mnbers nt Lacken, I marched yesterday moning in that direction. They fled and disprscd on our approach, but by the activity of my men several were taken : between s(and 60 were killed, all in arms, and five takn prisoners. Amongst the killed were severl in French uniforms. . . . Five men tme in this morning and surrendered theirarms under the proclamation."" And much more to the same effect. The Major-Generl might be dialing with Barkly West in the closing months of the nineteenth eentuy. But the Irish rebels' were not armed vith Mausers and machine guns, as weri their Dutch imitators. Their losses were frightful. In one short series of skirmishes with the Royal troops, the peasants los- 600 men killed; one militiaman was killed,, and 10 men wounded on the King's sde. CLEMENCY THiT FAILED. The Lord Lieutenant o: the day, like Lord Roberts, had to lament the non-success of his efforts to persuade tie rebels that they were in the wrong, and night avoid severe punishment by owning iheir fault and returning to the path of loyalty. Here is the text of a letter sent by His Excellency to a London Corporation, in nply to an address in support of his Irish jolicy : —" Gentlemen, When the force of His Majesty's arms had crushed the despenv.t efforts of rebellion, I was led to the hope that the extension of the Royal mercy to the deluded, would have had universil operation in restoring public peace, ani reviving a spirit of loyalty. I have been, however, concerned to find that in some parts of the Kingdom the clemency of oui Sovereign has failed, and I am under the disagreeable necessity of observing thit, when lenient measures are found to hove no effect, it will become necessary to punish, severely, those hardened criminals who have shown that they cannot be reclaimed by mercy." Messrs. Sauer and Merriman (says a Cape paper) would certainly object to having their "poor, misguided, unforUnate, ignorant" constituents who broke into rebellion described as " hardened criminals," yet the terms fits. The lower class Irish, in 1798, were goaded into insurrection by misery, wretchedness, ind hunger ; they had grievances which went home to every man. There they were less to be blamed than the rebels of the Cape, who could put their finger on no single substantial cause of complaint against the ruler whom they lived under. The cases are most alike, in that both Irish peasants and Dutch farmers listened with both ears to the voice •of the outside tempter. The French were to assist in driving the King's troops and all loyalists out of Ireland. The Republicans were to parcel out Cape Colony into farms for zealous rebels, once the "English gamson" was pushed into deep water- A Foreign Legion was a factor in both cases; in each, those who were rooted to the soil suffered most keenlv bv their folly. THE DECLINE OF CRICKET. In Auckland the interest of the general public in the fine old English game of cricket is certainly not increasing, though every Saturday during the summer months a large crowd of enthusiastic players make their way to the Domain ground, which presents quite a picturesque sight. The Domain certainly makes a splendid cricket ground, and you will be told that i+ is as true as a bil-liard-table. As a matter of fact it is this billiard-table smoothness that is spoiling the game of cricket, at least, so says the writer m a most interesting articl? in the Pilot, a new English weekly review. The writer, evidently an oh! cricketer, deplores "the condition "ink which the greatest of games has sunk. . . . The sad fact stares us in the face that there is a distinct falling off in the interest to those who understand." Why is this '! It is because owing to the perfection o« the ground the batsman can tell almost precisely how each ball will act. The science of patient defence has mastered the bowling so long as it is on the spot, and the moment it begins to be loose, ball after ball is sent to the boundary with a precision that is becoming* monotonous. The batsmen are masters of the situation, individual innings are too long, and too many games are drawn. The chief causes of this state of affairs are—(l) the perfect condition of the ground, and (2) ,the boundary system. With regard to the latter it is urged that batsmen should be made to run put their boundary strokes, for it is often after a hard four or five has been run that the bowler has his chance with the tired batsman. The remedies proposed arc—(l) higher wickets, (2) broader wickets, (3) narrower bats, (4) alteration in the Ibw rule, make it " out," if in the opinion of the umpire the ball pitched in a straight line from the bowler's hand to the wicket would have hit it. Alterations regarding . the boundary system, and the bringing in of the popping crease by six inches, are also suggested. The great thing is to place the bowler once more on a level with the batsman. Anything to save this grand old game from losing its interest for spectators and players is certainly worth most careful consideration. Tn New Zealand the need of reform is not so urgent as in England, for our batsmen have not yet attained to the degree of perfection some of the great English cricketers have reached ; but still indications are not wanting that even here we will eventually be eager to welcome any- ! thing in reason that may be done by the Home authorities to assist the bowler to cope with the growing superiority of the batsman. OUR ROADS. It is wonderful what an amount of energy is required t-r keep our local bodies up to the mark, and after all the success of these efforts is but partial. One is staggered to think how wo would fare if there were no cyclists, no Ratepayers' Association, and no people taking sufficient interest in civic matters to air their grievances in the newspapers. The cyclists are evidently going to be a thorn in the side of the City Council and every other public body concerned, in street-making until we get good roads. The wheelmen are. of course, aeting in their j

own interests, but all other people are likewise interested in having smooth well-made streets. Good roads are surely one of the first requisites of a civilised community, but they seem to be few and far between in New Zealand, and Auckland appears to be no better, though perhaps no worse, than other centres in this respect. The city streets are bad enough, but the combined effort at roadmalting of the Grey Lynn Borough Council and the Archhill Road Board, as exemplified by the portion of the Great North Road, for which they are jointly responsible, certainly " takes "the cake," to use a vulgarism. If the cyclists, or anybody else, succeed in shaming or ridiculing the local bodies into mending matters, they will earn the gratitude of every good ■ citizen. PRONUNCIATION. Reference has' been made in this column on more than one occasion to the unsatisfactory manner in which reading is taught in our public schools, one of the results being that a wretched mispronunciation of many common English words is becoming general among the rising generation. This failing does not appear to be confined to Auckland, for the chairman of the South Canterbury Education Board stated a few days ago that the worst fault in connection with the teaching of reading was the too common mispronunciation of such words as "may, say, day," which are frequently pronounced as if they were spelt " my," " sy, " dy." A Mr. Gow told the Board that "the worst fault in some of our schools, and the most trying to an examiner, is the extremely low "tone in which the children speak. In some cases it is a constant strain to listen to them. It is all a matter of training." WRITING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. Mr. R. B. Heriot, headmaster of the Remuera public school, courteously sends me a number of specimens of the handwriting of his sixth and seventh standard pupils. In doing so, he says : " I read with interest your remarks in the Herald on writing in the,public schools. I have always taken considerable pains with the teaching of this subject, as I consider it of great importance,, being one of the three R's which I maintain are the three principal subjects to be attended to in our elementary schools. We are commanded to use a set of copybooks which I don't think much of, and would not myself choose, but even with ' these, copybooks I am in the hope that you will'agree with me we do not turn out such bad writers in the'Remuera school." The specimens which Mr. Heriot encloses are certainly most creditable to the writers, and for clearness and legibility leave nothing to be desired. They are also exceedingly neat. But though there are exceptions there is a castiron sameness of style about them, while nothing will convince me that for commercial purposes this is the " fist," if I may be permitted to use the word, that ought to be encouraged. The Gexsral.'