NOTES AND COMMENTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVIII, Issue 17843, 26 July 1921, Page 4

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

DEATH-BED PHILOSOPHY.

The death of Mr. Franklin Lane, Secretary for the Interior under President Wilson, resulted from a serdous operation to which he submitted with cheerful philosophy. On his death-bed his instincts as an old newspaper reporter inspired him to dictate a statement of the impressions and feelings of a man who gambles upon the chances of life and death and loses. Mr. Lane said he had seen death in various forms, and often faced it, but on this occasion he was caUed upon to enter deliberately into the valley of the shadow. "Say what you will," he declared, "it ds a great act to walk upon a path the end of which I could not see. I -was not compelled to take it; my latest doctor advised me against it. It was a bet on a high card with a chance to win, and I took it." Mr. Lane declared that he had often pondered what words would express the synthesis of his philosophy in such a crisis, and when actually faced with the spectre of death he concluded that the best statement of his creed could be fitted into the words, " I accept," which meant to him that if in the law of nature his individual spirit was to go back into the great ocean of spirits his one dutv was to conform. " Lead, kindly light," concluded Mr. Lane, " was all the gospel I had. I accepted." A SALVAGING FEAT. An account is given in the Navy of the work of salving the Italian battleship Leonardo da Vinci, which blew up in Taranto Harbour during the war and sank keel uppermost. After being raised from the mud at the bottom, in which the gun turrets were embedded, the wreck floated upside down for many months while repairs were made to enable it to be towed to a dry dock. This was done on September 17, 1919. The ship wa s floated iuto the dry dock still upside down, and there followed 12 months of repair work to make the hull watertight. Her gun turrets had to be cut out as she lay in the harbour, and diving operations subsequently succeeded in recovering six of her 12in. guns from the sunken turrets. On January 22 last the hull was floated out the dry dock and towed out into deep water in the inner roadstead at Taranto. About 2900 tons of water were slowly pumped into the double bottom on the starboard side, and a further 2800 tons were pumped into more compartments all along the side. This influx of water gave the hull a list which gradually became greater and greater. Then when she was just on the verge of turning over, all those working on board left the ship. It was computed that a further 1700 tons would roll her over on an even keel. x'vctually only 850 tons had been pumped in when she suddenly swung round and plunged her keel once more in its rightful place, under water. The whole operation was enormously?- expensive, and indeed it has been computed that the cost of salving the ship exceeded the original cost of building her. The expense, however, was considered to be justified by the knowledge gained in solving problems of ship salvage in unusual conditions. The use to which the salved hull will be put i s not yet known. It was a remarkable feat of engineering, never hitherto attempted by any navy in the world, and several officers of the Italian Naval Engineering Corps who had worked on the problem for more than four years were deservedly decorated by the Minister for Marine. The Italain Navy League in celebration of the event has produced a medal, both as a memorial to those who perished in the explosion and to those who laboured to salve the ship. COAL AND SHIPPING. Addressing the annual meeting of the Royal Mail Steam Packet Company, the chairman, Sir Owen Phillips, referred to the high cost of coal, and predicted much lower prices in future. "I have recently been looking into the question of the actual cost of coal to this company at the time when first I became chairman," he said. "I find that in 1902 the average cost of all coa-l consumed by the company's steamers in all the ports we serve, including rail carriage and freight, was exactly 22s a ton. In the following year (1903) the average price had increased to 22s 3d, while 10 years later, namely, in 1913, the, average cost, including railage and freight, had increased to 22s lid, which latter figure in those days we considered a very high average price. Last year the average cost per ton of all coal consumed by our steamers, including railage and freight, was 120s Id, as against the 1913 price of 22s lid. The average price of coal, including railage and freight, has now dropped considerably, but those who believe that it will' be possible to continue to sell coal at over £1 a ton will, I fear, have a very rude awakening in the near future. The high cost of coal in recent years has led to our coal export trade being reduced from about 70,000,000 tons per annum to less than 25,000,000 tons. If we are to regain our trade supremacy and secure emplyoment for the large number of steamers now laid up, it is absolutely essential that the price of coal should come down to its pre-war level, or possibly even lower, as it is always difficult to regain markets that have once been lost." As to the slump in shipping, Sir Owen Phillips said: "The amount of tonnage of all nations which is at present lying idle in the ports of the world may, I think, be assumed to be not much less than 8,000,000 tons gross register, and probably more. All over the world the ports are full of vessels for which no employment is available. Owing to the severe slump in trade, the actual volume of the world's overseas commerce at the moment is less than it was in July, 1914, so that there are still more than sufficient vessels not laid up to carry all the cargo offering."

THE TRIPLE ALLIANCE. The inner history of the calling off of the threatened Triple Alliance strike in support of the miners, arranged for 10 p.m. on Friday, April 15, is revealed in a report submitted by the executive council of the National Transport Workers' Federation, to the annual general meeting in Edinburgh. The report deals at length with the incidents which led up to the crisis, and explains that it was discovered that "inside the ranks of the Miners' Fed eration there was a lack of cohesion and a_ want of unanimity which was necessary n the other three sections were not to he jeopardised. One of the most regrettable features in connection with the whole of the crisis, proceeds the report, was the desire on the part of the miners—warrantable in many respects, unreasonable in others—to consider their own affairs in their own way oblivious of the effect of their own attitude upon the members of the other three organisations. They were out because of a grievance essentsiallv their own. It had been determined to call out railwaymen and transport workers, not because of any immediate grievances of their own, but because of the bonds of solidarity created througj the alliance. We had endeavoured to induce the Miners' Federation to attend the conference and break again definitelv with the Government if no other course was possible on the question of wages. This they refused to do. In their consideration for the attitude of their own members in the country they couid, and would, make no allowance for the entirely different circumstances obtaining in the other three organisations. The alliance never acted as one body. The three sections sat m different rooms as three different organisations, taking their own decisions, and yet were expected to keep intact to fight the organised powar of the Government and the emplovers." The resolution calling off the strike was carried with only five dissentients, after an amendment that the Miners' Federation should be asked to meet the three transport organisations again had been defeated by 28 votes to 12.