NOTES AND COMMENTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIX, Issue 18130, 30 June 1922, Page 6

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

MODERN ENGLISH. Thore are probably still many people who Iwlieve that all dialect, whether of the rustic labourer, or the old-fashioned Cockney, is ," corrupt English," says Professor Ernest Weekley in the Cornhill Magazine. There are certainly very few who realise that the exact opposite is the case, and that "standard English *' is " corrupt dialect." Of all those historic dialects which still distinguish, to a greater or less degree, the speech of most Englishmen, none is of such interest as Cockney, that noble blend of East Mercian, Kentish, and East Anglian, which, written by Chaucer, printed by Oaxton, spokon by Spenser and Milton, and surviving in the mouths of Sam Weller and Mrs. Gianp, has, in a modified form and with an artificial pronunciation, given us the literary English of the present dayUnfortunately, its written records are few. Our modern pronunciation is largely the -result of spelling, and spelling always tendu toward the conventional and pedantic, the very process of learning to read and write involving inevitably the. acceptance of much that is traditional or accidental .... Roughly speaking, it may be said that, before the age of Elizabeth, no one was interested in English as a language. The vernacular was simply a means of communication, not an artistic instrument. With the great Elizabethan ago came the creation of a literary medium gradually departing from over/day speech, together with a conscious attitude toward language as such. The writers of that age show no trace of dialect, except for an occasional provincialism, because the printers reduced to almost modern uniformity any unusual spelling which might have revealed the writer's own pronunciation- That the speech of men of rank ehowed at that period great variation is beyond disputeWe have contemporary evidence for the fact that the brilliant. Raleigh spoke broad Devonshire to the end of his life; and it is not likely that the language of Drake and Hawkins diffored materially 'from that of' a present-day Brixham trawler.

LABOUR AND LEISURE. Taking as his text a number of recant books on various, aspects of business and organisation, Mr. A. E. Zimmern, in the Quarterly Review, discusses •" The Problem of Modern Industry." " It is a mistaken diagnosis when men fix on poverty or insecurity as the root of the diecontents in our modern society," he declares. " No true man who has tried both would prefer slavery, cushioned by a bank balance, in a gilded cage, to liberty and all that liberty brings with it in the life of thought and feeling- If the denial or diminution of liberty be really the canker of our age, it is important to bear in mind that the. malady is not confined to the working class only, but infects our -whole social system. Judged by the'subjectivo test, the " salariat " is almost as much enslaved as the proletariat; and the managing director, chained to his office for eight or ten hours a day is not in much better case. There is a large and important school of present-day industrialists and. social thinkers who, accepting a joyless drudgery at mechanical tasks aa an unalterable condition of modern civilisation for the majority of men and women, and being prepared to pay the price for the comforts and conveniences that it involves, sees in leisure, and in loisure alone, the only possibility of freedom and happiness for the normal modern producer. In other words, they are prepared to acquiesce in the servile State. Men and women are to ba chained like slaves to a dehumanising employment' for the greater part of their day, and to be set free, after shortened hours, to seek the true expression of their personality in domesticity, recreation, and amusement.

MONOTONOUS WORK. Another aspect of this question was discussed by Professor T. H. Pear, of Manchester University, inv a -lecture on psychology- "It has been said recently," he remarked • " that the nineteenth century was the age of mechanism and that the twentieth century will be the age of humanism. Whether that is true or not I don't know, but there is no doubt thai, the study of the human factor has increased enormously during the last 20 years. It is possible that it will go on increasing, and as there aro 75 years of this century still left to us it is within our power to make this the age of humanism.'* The question of monotonous work had been much discussed of late. They ali knew how industry was employing mass methods of production. There was the case of a six-foot man spending all bis life screwing on a nut as his part in a process of manufacture. They might become excited at such a spectacle and say it was not fit work for a human being and that it must drive the man mad. But it might be suggested to such an objector that some people liked monotony, and that what was monotonous for one man was not monotonous for another. " We do not," said Professor Pear, "know enough about the different attitudes of workers toward monotonous work to generalise about the subject yet-"

PARACHUTES AND AIRCRAFT. Advocates of parachutes continue to urge the British Air Ministry to make equipment with them compulsory on all civilian aeroplanes. It is not, however, stupidity or conservatism or economy that is in the way of adopting such a measure, says the Manchester Guardian. It is a conviction that the parachute would be of very little use, and then only in a very small proportion of mishaps, and that it is far better at the present stage to concentrate on the prevention of fire, structural defects, and control uncertainty. The matter may be said to be always undep consideration at the Air Ministry, but it is felt that a sharp distinction must be drawn between war conditions, between kite-balloons and aeroplanes manned by experienced men accustomed to taking risks, and civil flying in machines occupied by ordinary \ passengers, men and women, middle-aged or delicate. In accidents occurring at a low altitude the parachute would be useless. In the case of mishaps at sufficient alti ,tude, even ji the machine were in such a condition that normal exit from it could be made and the parachutes themselves were not damaged, it would not be so simple as taking to lifebelts at sea (if that be simple). Further, in the great majority of cases the pilot is hopeful till the end of making a safe landing, and innumerable instances show that this confidence is well placed. At any.rate the view of the autnorities is that in ordinary air traffic it should be possible to remove the causes of accidents. Fire can be prevented, but even in the case of fire it has often been found possible to land- without personal injury. Collision in the air would certainly make the use of parachutes impossible. It is, in short, felt that a premature adoption of compulsory would have the effect of detracting attention from more important details, and would sometimes induce ..the pilot to order parachutes out and abandon the machine when by remaining in it there would actually be no loss of life.