NOTES AND COMMENTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIX, Issue 15069, 12 August 1912, Page 6

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

USE OF OIL FOR FUEL, It is somewhat remarkable to read at the present time the observations made by Professor Stanley Jevons, a great authority on economics, concerning the use of petroleum as a substitute for coal, in his work on "The Coal Question." He said, writing in 1865 : — Petroleum has of late years become the matter of a most extensive trade. ... Its natural supply is far more limited and uncertain than that of coal, its price is about £15 per ton already." America is now producing from its countless oil wells about half-a-million barrels of oil daily, and it is estimated that the pipe-lines alone are- charged at all times with oil to the value of twelve million dollars. There were periods, shortly after the Texas oil discoveries, when the value of a barrel of oil in that State sank as low as 10 cents, but that was partly because the fuel oils were little esteemed, and were originally rather a drug upon the market. In consequence of the increasing demand for " petrol or petroleum spirit, oil oil-supplies capable of affording abundance of petrol are rising in price, and even the gases from the oil wells are being collected and condensed. The use of petrol has given a new importance to the distilling trade, and the preparation of the lighter distillates has beconio a most important industry. It is a disadvantage that the restrictions placed on the transport of oil in Great Britain are so severe, being apparently based on the view that it is "an article scarcely less dangerous than dynamite," as was said by Sir Marcus Samuel recently. Under proper precautions petrol can be handled and stored without undue risk; but .what is really required is a thorough investigation of the best means of transport and storage, and of the precautions to be taken in the event of fires in proximity to storage tanks. THE FASHION IN LITERATURE. There is (says a writer in the Academy) a fashion in literature as truly as there is a fashion in clothes. Th© literary fashion of to-day is a gentle superiority to accepted truth. Religious sentiment has come to be regarded as an affectation and nothing more. In the novel, the play, and most of the poetry of the day it is either ignored altogether, or used as a medium with which to paint the mere vividly eccentricities of character. To be religious is to bo ridiculous, aud (lie self-conscious Briton being in dread of nothing so much as of making a fool of himself, joins the colours of the new brigade in his writing and in his reading. Nothing must be left sacred ; all must bo profaned. The laurels : which were wont to adorn the brow of the I greatest artist have passed to the un- ! worthy brow of the most daring extrej mist. The "groat" writers are. now they 1 who rush in and pluck down the veil I which until their advent had covered human I shame. They focus a fierce light upon iniquity in high places, and think they havo proved society to be rotten. Thev distort prophecy and imagine they have convicted the prophet of falsehood ; and having done so, they finally dupe a toe credulous public into following them. Looking proudly at. the havoc they have wrought, they are pleased to call it "art.' So wo arc. left to wonder whether the : time will come again when men shall dea I in .truth and justice. We have growr somewhat weary of the neurotic literature of our time, nor can we all believe thai human nature is the poor distorted thine that many would have us think it to be For long we have allowed our souls to hi starved; aro our intellects also to suffei fur l:irl.- r>f nniirifilnneiit,' With soul ct(\

prived of true religion and intellect of true art, a nation may as well prepare its death-warrant. The English nation at the present moment is waiting with failing breath for a man to arise and prescribe (ho antidote to the literary poison it has been forced to swallow."

THE UNIVERSITY MAN IN BUSINESS. Speaking at the Congress of the Universities of the Empire at the Imperial Institute, London, Sir George Gibb, who is a graduate of Aberdeen University and who made his name as a railway manager, and director, said it was of national importance to improve the quality of recruits for business life. He did not know of any source where employers were more likely to find with certainty the improved quality that was required than in the universities. Ho had no doubt whatever as to the advantages in commercial life of having obtained the better training, tho wider outlook, and the greater capacity that came from the university. A man who went to the university started three years behind the man who did not go; but he soon made up for the lost time, because his university training had made him a better man for commercial work, had equipped him to fill a high position in commercial management. What they wanted at universities was mental training; technical knowledge could come later. Mr. H. A. Roberts, of the Cambridge Appointments Committee, speaking on the samo occasion, said the old idea that university men were no good in business, was rapidly passing in England. He quoted a letter from " a man of great eminence in the business world " who had at first shared this prejudice, but who after taking into his service several Cambridge graduates, wrote : "I am satisfied that I exaggerated the length of time required for a university man to overtake ; men who have had the advantage of a preliminary mercantile training."