NOTES AND COMMENTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 19963, 4 June 1928, Page 8

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

THE GRUMBLER. " The Englishman is frequently called a grumbler," says a writer in the Times, " and it is a reputation which he scarcely takes the trouble to deny, because, after all, he rarely takes his complaints seriously, or at any rate quickly rejects the sympathy of anyone else who endorses his own description of his misery. Yet the disposition to grumble may lead to deplorable results, and it becomes everyone who desires to play the man and acquire a character strong enough to discharge his duty with courage and cheerfulness to be on his guard against the weak folly of discontent. Its root is self-conceit, and its fruit sours the springs of life. The grumbler is a radically untruthful man, because he lives with a distorted conception of himself, his deserts and his importance. He also runs the risk of becoming an entirely hard-hearted man, for, by making his own comfort his chief aim, he becomes careless of the happiness or welfare of others. What right has any man to expect special favours of providence, or to demand as the condition of his acceptance of life's fortunes that they shall always be to his liking, or that he shall be saved from everything that brings hardship? If demands such as these were complied with, the result must be a complete lack of moral strength, with the loss of all that makes life honourable in service and worthy in character. It is a readiness to bear adversity cheerfully, to suffer for duty's sake gladly, that gives to moral vigour and the truest self-respect. CASH-ON-DELIVERY TRADING. Extensions of the cash-on-delivery system have been introduced in Britain, facilities similar to those available by parcel post having been applied to letteis sent by registered post and to heavy goods despatched by rail. According to the memorandum issued by the post office the essential feature of the railway cash-on-delivery service is that tradeis and farmers will be able to foward by post to the consignee a cash-on-delivery letter-*-deliverable on payment of the amount due —which will entitle him to obtain delivery from the railway. Ihey will be able to send goods of any weight as cash-on-delivery consignments and to take advantage of the favourable rates quoted by the railway companies for certain commodities. Endorsing the view that any facilities tending to bring buyer and seller together by simplifying trading transactions must also tend to the expansion and general benefit of our home trade. The Times remarks that the advantages of the inland C.O.D. system have been clearly proved. In the second year of its existence the number of parcels carried by the service—of an average value of £1 had risen from 1,000,000 to an annual total of about 1,500,000. The service has worked smoothly and without financial loss to the department, and the postal authorities have shown themselves efficient carriers df parcels and successful collectors of money on behalf of those who use the system. At the same time the. incomprehensible. and short-sighted opposition set up by some trading organisations appears to have died away—presumably because the fears on which it was based have been found to be groundless—so that altogether there appear to be both justification and room for its further extension. HUMAN AND ANIMAL SIGHT. Addressing the annual congress of the Opbthalmological Society of the United Kingdom, Professor G. Elliot Smith said that recent researches had shown that in man and his nearest allies such revolutionary changes had been effected in every part of the visual system as to justify the statement that a new visual instrument had been evolved. We might speak of the emergence of a new vision, which differed profoundly from that enjoyed by all other living creatures. These changes were intimately related to the evolution of intelligence and the attainment of what were known as insight, foresight, and the wider vision. A quarter of a century ago the lecturer introduced the term neopallium to express a new conception of the nature of the essential evolutionary changes that transformed the brain of a primitive reptile into that of a mammal and conferred enormously enhanced powers of learning from experience and modifying behaviour. In monkeys and man further profound changes occurred in the visual system. A definite macula lutea (the "yellow spot") developed in the retina, and this small area added a contribution to the optic nerve and tract that was out of all proportion to its size. The development of macular vision conferred on man the ability to see the world and appreciate its meaning in a way that no other living creature was able to do. His new vision depended on powers of visual perception as distinctive as the use of articulate speech respectively to see and give expression to his thoughts. Ihe late Dr. Henry Watt, of Glasgow, expressed the opinion that of the conditions that enriched the sensory basis of the human mind probably the most important weie the functions of the macula lutea, of accommodation and of static stereoscopy and the development of a delicate skin and prehensile hands. All these conditions, added the lecturer, that conferred on man the fuller vision to see and understand the world and interpret what was happening around him, could bp shown to be the results directly or indirectly of those profound structural revolutions which had given man what was virtually a new instrument of sight and with it a new vision.