ON THINGS IN GENERAL.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 11756, 11 September 1901, Page 3

ON THINGS IN GENERAL.

GAMBLING. ON Friday last a friend from Scotland, the Pev. Dr. Marshall, told us that both in tho Old Country and in the colonies the love of gambling was too prevalent, and I for one will say ditto. It is, I admit, hard to see the great wickedness of two men with a thousand a year coming in and owing no man anything risking a sixpence over a game f whist. Indeed I have a recollection that the late Archbishop Magee was prepared to defend gambling under such circumstances. Still no ons will deny that excessive gambling like excessive eating or drinking, is jjal.' However, it is a mistake to think that .rambling is a modern evil. It may bo more general now than it was in former times, but our forefathers, or some of them, indulged in gambling with a recklessness which few in our days can equal. Though George 111. set his face against gambling of any sort, forbidding it in the Royal palaces, ve t the mania for card-playing increased during his reign. Charles Fox, the great statesman and orator, was a dreadful gambler was frequently cheated, and altogether lost about £200,000 at cards. Gibbon records bow he once watched him when lie was plaving for 22 hours at a sitting and losing £50*0 an hour. Fox used to say that the greatest pleasure in life, after winning, was losing. His best friends are said to have been half-ruined in annuities given by them as securities for him to the Jews. £500,000 per annum of these annuities of Fox and {lis society were advertised for sale at one time. The witty Walpole wondered what he would do when he had sold the estates of all his friends ! In three nights Charles and s his brother, Stephen Foxthe eldest not 25 rears of —lost £23,000 between them. Another incurable gambler was Lord Thanet, whose income was not less than £50,000 a ear, every farthing of which, he lost at j cards. HISTORIC GAMBLING-HOUSE. The celebrated White's Club was in the ■ beginning principally a _ gambling-house. Professional players, provided they were free from the imputation of cheating, easily procured admission. The celebrated beetlebrowed high-shouldered, Earl of Chesterfield lived there, gaming and pronouncing witticisms, yet warning his son that a member of a gaming club should be a cheat or be would soon be a beggar ! The gambling that went on there in the early years of George 111. was frightful. The kindly, high-bred, extravagant Earl of Carlisle lost £10.000 there in one night. Sir John Bland, who shot himself in 1755, flung away his whole fortune there. Lord Mountford was another who came to a tragic end through his losses at White's. Having gambled away large sums, and fearing to be reduced to distress, he asked for a Government appointment, determining to throw the die of life or death on the answer. The answer was unfavourable. He sent for a lawyer and executed his will, inquiring whether it would hold good though a man were to shoot himself. Being assured that it would, he said, " Pray stay while I step into the next room;" went into the next room and shot himself. John Damier and •his two brothers contracted at White's a debt of £70,000. Lord Foley's two sons borrowed so extravagantly that the interest (liey had to pay amounted to £18,000 a year. What hours, what nights, what fortunes, Fox and hi 3 contemporaries, the men of the Georges, waited over the devil's picturehooks ! But Charles Fox took his losses philosophically enough, and after an awful night's play would be found on a sofa tranquilly reading his Virgil. TIME TO STOP. During the discussion of the Budget in Parliament and elsewhere during the last few days the present situation has been likened to many things more or less appropriate. One of the most striking of the similes used was that which regarded the State as an engine of which the Premier is the driver. In making this comparison at a meeting of the Wellington Ironmasters Association the other day Mr. John Hutcheson, M.H.R., said Mr. Seddon was undoubtedly a bold and fearless driver but it was only in accordance with the fitness ot things that he should have a guard behind him. Parliament acted as a guard to some extent, but as a general thing the driver disconnected the signal-rope and drove the engine without control. To make him understand that it was time to stop it was necessary to run along the top of the carriages and hit him on the head with a chunk of COal ' CORONERS' INQUESTS. An interesting return was published in the Herald the other day giving the cost ot inquests. During the two years prior to the coming in force of the payment of Jurors Act Auckland came second as regards the number of inquests, but since the passing of that Act Auckland has moved up to first place. If we don't get our share of public expenditure for railways, roads, and bridges, we at any rate do very well as inquests, for which Auckland drew £1000, Dunedin coming next with £6+5. Inquests, though they should be very solemn functions, sometimes have a humorous aspect. It is stated that recently a mummy, consigned from Peru to Brussels, was detained at the London and North-Western Railways goods depot at Broad-street, and became tho subject of an inquest. The jury with unconscious humour, returned a verdict that the body was that of "a female person, aged about 25 years," and that she died in a manner "unknown to them, and that the evidence did not disclose any recent crime in this country." Sir Julius von Haast. during some of his excavations in New Zealand, on one occasion announced that he had discovered the remains of a prehistoric man, and was considerably surprised when a day or two later he received a communication from the local coroner demanding particulars of his discovery, the whereabouts of the remains, and intimating that ha must be prepared to give evidence at the inquest. HOW NOT TO PAY DEBTS. Speaking in Parliament the other day, Mr. Atkinson said the Imprisonment for Debt Abolition- Bill, which was becoming known as the Fraudulent Debtors' Protection Bill, should be reconsidered. 'He mentioned that a professional man whose wife has an income of £1000 could not bo made to pay a MO debt. An English solicitor has just writ: en a book with the attractive title of :~°Y to Avoid Payment of Debts." This book shows that things are just as bador as goou from the fraudulent debtors' point of view in England as in New Zealand. The writer says: —" Where a man has properly preparet. for the operation, he may incur debts from this, that, and the other tradesman, may go on incurring debts, and may put his foot down and say, ' I shall not pay one penny to any one of those creditors.' And I say that a man with this dishonourable intention cannot be forced to pay. and, as there is 110 imprisonment for debt in this country, cannot be punished so long as ho can reasonably "wear that lie had no criminal intention to • defraud when he ordered the goods. ' It is, of course, almost impossible for i creditor to prove that a debtor bid such a criminal intention. It: is the old story. In days gone by honest debtors were treated with great harshness. This caused, a scandal; reform ■was demanded; and the pendulum swung the other way, tho result being that a clever and unscrupulous debtor, by taking a few simple precautions, can now swindle with impunity. SCHOOL PUNISHMENTS. At a recent meeting of the North Canterbury Education Board, Mr. Buddo gave notice of his intention to mow that a regulation be framed to prevent the keeping in of children as punishment or otherwise. There is certainly something to be said in favour the motion, but the question arises, How are bad children to be punished? Some say they must not be flogged ; others that they ttust not be given homework, so they can't ™ impositions at night: while others again »-?T?e with Mi. Buddo that they must not "6 kept i.i after school hours. How, then, are they to bo punished? My own opinion 's that for real badness they should lie ''°gged—not brutally, of coursebut still 'everely, if necessary. I mean by badness such offences as lying, laziness, and wilful disobedience. For dulness, slowness of intellect, or any mental shortcomings, a child °ught not to be punished at all. Such children want sympathy, and patience—not punI*'; but " s pa-re the rod and spoil the Wuld 'is a motto that Education Boards, com--81,^ eeS ' and schoolmaster? should not altogether lose sight of, for it is as applicable a the ease of bad boys in the twentieth ceuwy as over it was. The schoolmaster, like ie parent, should always have the power ® use the rod. in the background. This power has been iu all ages a terror to juvene evildoers, and it is well that they should now that-their evildoing must and will be sbnlf I' would not be wise at one in!? 1 to - a ' x ?'' s^l caning, home impositions, a keeping in, until a generation of perfect youngsters arises. The General.