PREMIERS' HOBBIES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18455, 19 July 1923, Page 14

PREMIERS' HOBBIES.

" Ambition is not one of the qualities which endear an English statesman to his fellows. ; • We all like to think that our Prime Minister, whoever he may be, would rather be doing something else instead of governing the country; and Disraeli is probably the only British Premier within recent times who failed to pay this tribute to British preferences.,. Successful novelist though he was, he never pretended..either to himself or to others that he would rather he the author of a "best seller " than the director of his country's destinies. Examples of the opposite tendency are numerous. •■■>■■■ ~ , Gladstone, as we all know, delighted to turn his back on politics in order- to read Homer and argue with Catholics and agnostics. •; • ■ ', : Lord Salisbury, similarly, was happier •in the laboratory than in the Cabinet; the Earl of Balfour, ' amid the cares of office, hankered after music and philosophy; while Lord Eosebery's heart was generally understood -to be on the turf.. .-.."■ -.'.-'"■ .?• Now, in conformity with this long tradition, we learn that Mr. Stanley Baldwin, if he were free to follow his inclinations, would spend his time among his books and pigs. . That does not mean, of course, that the thought of books and pigs is likely to distract his attention from more serious matters. , , ' .> : .'••.•: It is merely the special touch of nature which makes the whole world akin in England.