NOTES AND COMMENTS.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1260, 23 April 1896, Page 32

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

The Labour Bureau has helped 11,000 men to work ; these had 35,000 dependent upon thorn ; the Bureau has been five years in existence. Is anything required to better that complete and very extraordinary record ? Has any Government done anything like it anywhere, in the time named, or any other? Nothing is required to better tho record, no Goverment has done anything like it any where. There is, nevertheless, a record that beats it. It is the falsehood and misrepresentation to which the Opposition and its organs have subjected the Bureau from the lirst. Facts are'against them, and the greatest of all the facts in the situation is that they ignore truth, fight unfairly, and are open to no decent influence.

The question of sandwich men has been raised in connection with tho unemployed. It is, of course, certain that work of that kind draws special attention to tho condition of men who are unfortunate. The man who manfully faces tho disagreeable thing is much to be admired. But let him face it himself of his own motion, and let the people who want to advertise their wares or properties by such methods pay a fair price for it. The man who forces down wages in order to advertise a patent medicine, as was done in Christchurch tho other day, by the sandwich method is mean. Tho charitable authority which lends itself to the forcing process is a hideous example of the worst kind of Bumbledom.

The best plan of all would bo to abolish the sandwich business altogether. It is unnecessary, it relieves but little distress, and that can be relieved by other means. While wo have tho unemployed with us who are unemployed through no fault of their own, let us respect their feelings and show them some sympathy.

To get them on land, the Land for Settlement Act must be amended. Lot it bo amended. The distance limit is too far from tho towns where relief is most wanted; the Purchasing Board’s limits are too narrow for brains. These are the things that require amendment'. Liberal wolves in sheep’s clothing helped the Conservatives to give us these defects. They must now bo regarded as both equally disingenuous in their conduct, and reform must bo made in spiff! of them.

Theory and fact are making the usual conflict in tho mind of Freotrade just now in New South Wales. Mr Reid's policy, being Freotrade, provided for free sugar — by a gradual process. Tho sugar people aro crying out that free sugar will wipe their industry oil the face of the earth. Mr Reid is temporisingly talking about bonusos, loans, and other bolsturings up. Oh, those Freetraders! Wo can understand Freotrade, and wo can understand Protection. But Freotrade tempered by Protection is a nondescript which every man must hate.

Far better is Mr Reid’s treatment of the coal strike. Ho is read} to mediate if both parties are agreeable. While everybody is trying, not too successfully, to make both parties agreeable, we may be pardoned for remarking that a compulsory Arbitration Act would have caused this matter, which is now threatening many homes with ruin, and a fine trade with disaster, to have been amicably settled long ago, with the confidence of both parties.

By the lire above Oriental Lay last week the necessity for increased power at the higher levels is not made less clear. The weakness of the jets will be a fact useful in the discussion the Council is shortly going to have on the subject. We trust it will bear fruit.

What the merits or demerits of the Irish Land Bill of the Conservaties may bo we can not fairly tell by reading tho cable message descriptive of its contents. Put one thing is very certain, it is that the mere fact that such a measure is drawn up by those who have stood for coercion in Ireland is conclusive evidence that the Irish people who have been so long dragooned and ridiculed lor demanding the removal of their gricvaiic..; have Imd real grievances Irom the lir t. if not, why boo.> Mr liulfour, with Lord Salisbury’a concent, admit that whatever happens to tho Hill, Ireland ientitled to have the fair rent clauses pamed ? The Conservatives now say that. Iri.Mi rents have been always unfair and aro unfair now, and must be made fair ; in other words, that landlordism is legalisod robbery, and must lie made virtuous. Then why have they put so many Irishmen in prison for saying tlu samo thing? And why have they suspended tho Constitution so often during the present century ? It is nut wonderful that a nation which lifts to suffer legalised robbery should be discontented. The wonder is, not that they have agitated, but that they have not been, like the Cubans, in it state of constant rebellion.

Who does not know tho prejudice of centuries against coroner’s quest law ? There is no one. Then (here is no one who can object to tho proposed abolition of coroner’s juries.

What would Plimsoll say ? To a request for exemption against the salutary law, which has saved many lives, by regulating stowage of ships, especially in the matter of deck cargoes, that great reformer would display a very emphatic method of protest. Rvery right-thinking man will bo of his opinion on reading that tho Cabinet refused tlm Kaipara icq nest for an exemption. They might as v.u-li have been a&kod to allow the Plimsoll mark to bo altered. These regulations, it is time for.jaii con

corned to realise, are real and really meant.

The Matabede rising is a curious commentary on Mr Shaw’s enthusiastic description of tho marvellous results of tho Rhodes rcj'unc, which Mr Stead said “ is enough to make the mouths of Germans and Frenchmen water.” “No moro striking evidence of modern progress could be given,” writes Mr Shaw,” “ than the sudden advance of Matabeluland from a state of complete and savage despotism to a country smiling under an energetic and just English control. The points of this control are many; “a population England may well bo proud of ” is the chief note accompanying the theme of chambers of commerce, town councils, mining developments, police perfection, agricultural contentment and many other blessings. The cables are supplying us with the contrast in tho shape of tho doings of this population “to be proud of.” The population has sprung a mine, and tho whole fabric is tottering; and some people even fear a huge catastrophe, brought about by tho optimism of Sir Hercules Robinson relying on insufliciont supplies of Maxim cartridges. News from there is getting interesting.

All honour to Lady Stout for her prompt action in getting a resolution dictatory to Governments and local bodies rescinded. That was conduct according to the spirit of the movement, and credit is duo to the lady who reminded her sisters of their obligations.

No one who has road the reports of the Morcadool dummying case is astonished that tho Court ' found the dummying proved up to the hilt. It is one of the most flagrant cases of our time. Tho evidence revealed systematic deceit, and a vast machinery of trickery by which settlement was defrauded of most valuable public lands. Tho story is a shock to those who rely—or pretend so whenever they think of tlm Hou John McKenzie's dummy hunts—on the native uprightness of human nature. This case proves to them, what they ought to have known as well as the Minister knew, that men who in private life scorn to be untruthful and detest cheating, will in their dealings with public property lie and instigate perjury, and defraud the public wholesale without scruple or reservation.

Doctor Purdy's verdict about Plimmerton is sensible, and his ideas are not diflicult to carry out. The fact is that the place has been rushed a little before it is ready for habitation, and things have not been quite pleasant in consequence. The great wants are, as they are everywhere in new places, water, drainage and scavongcring. The people have begun by buying sections. They will build in due course, and certainly they will supply themselves with tanks. Drainage must and can be easily provided for by united action under municipal authority, and the same may bo said about the scavenger work ; and certainly the natural water supply can be kept free by those means from contamination. The matter lias been taken in hand in time, lly the way, that was a good idea that somebody suggested : that the plans of all houses should bo submitted to the municipal authorities. There is one of the keys to the sanitation of now places.

The sixpenny telegram will be a boon to the masses, it must work for the benefit of the majority of those who use the telegraphs, it will probably increase the profits of the department—reduction of prices generally does, according to a golden rule which has not yet gained the oar of all New Zealanders, political as well as nonpolitical—and it will create a healthy ferment in the department by linding employment for more operators. In twelve months’ time there will probably be twelve times twelve reasons for upholding tho new departure. But of all these reasons one only will be accepted of tho populace in general, rid Mi a-?,— nothing succeeds liko success.

Bravo, Dr Findlay ! You undertook to lecture on a science which is not a science at all; pMitical science. You refrained from the example of those who make up for uncertainty by dogmatism. You modest Iv began a! the beginning of a very great siibj ■* * , a :c| you Mowed prae! ically (in! whit' V"!' may he t bought of the el ii in.-', put ihrward oil behalf of the subject to be ea lb' i a science, it i ; a subject, which ought to be studied in an exact manner. Nothing could he heller than your first lecture. Keep it up, sir; keep il up, and prosper. The young m<-Ji who devote their leisure to good work am the young men whose old age will he honoured.

One man’s hobby i; cricket, and his reputation goes up to the stars. Another’s is football, and his goes beyond the stars. A third takes to the water, and his reputa-tion-hard it is to say, Imt wo speak correctly by comparison—is of the water watery. The poet has said that “tho earth hath bubbles as the water hath,” but the bubbles of the earth are bigger and brighter in tho social firmament and in the empyrean of sport than the bubbles of the water. This is wrong. But what shall lie said of the reputation of tho earnest man chose hobby is noble —though we must all admit, humble creatures us wo are, that it is merely mental ? Can we say, in the midst of our proudest civilisation, that as a bubble it is equal to the bubbles of sport ?

Tim best thing in Dr Findlay’s paper is “ Let us become students of the facts before we dogmatise as zealots for reform.” That was a bombshell of common sense which ought to explode with some effect in the Convention of Women, at which it was aimed. 'The women are infected with the mischievous idea of wanting to " do something at once, at any price;” which is only

not ludicrous because these women havevotes. It behoves every man of souse and courage to tell them the truth. Dr Findlay lias done that, and wo applaud him.

i le evidently does not think that political science is a science. But ho regards politics as a thing to be studied seriously. Again we applaud him.

As to tho Women’s Convention, and their i list of a million resolutions on some of tho j most abstruse subjects on the face of the j earth—subjects which have paralysed the j male intellect for centuries; a list now re- ; markable for its definite conclusions and . peremptory demands to have these con- j elusions forthwith adopted and made statute law under pain of everything but death ; what does that list remind us of ? It reminds us of the ways of the ordinary “ hen convention,” well known socially before the franchise days. Somebody read a j resolution, nobody said anything, the resolution passed, the Convention separated, and next day every hen was astounded at i what she had agreed to. j

We note with deep sorrow that our evening contemporary thinks that neither .Sir Robert Stout nor Captain Russell are fit to tilt against the Government. He mourns over them both as having bended the knee in the House ot Rimmon, whose agents are, as everybody knows, the Bank of New Zealand. He. decorously, but emphatically, prefers to pin his faith on Messrs Dutliie and George Hutchison. John Dutliie and George Hutchison ! ’Think of it! Picture it!—the signs of the political atmosphere are that there will be an enquiry Du Lunatico somewhere very soon.

Major L ilhaire’.s acquittal need take no one by surprise, lie murdered the unfortunate Englishman Stokes in the most deliberate,cruel way. The authorities of the Congo Free State knew it. But the exigencies of their governing position required that they should pretend to believe him innocent. Justice was a thing as impossible as the resurrection of tho victim, and no one could expect the Congo Free State people to take any other view. But in all probability they will reform their ways and be careful not to send any more young bloods of tigerish tendencies to Africa. In the end, then, poor Stokes will not have died in vain.

'The Newcastle proprietors have at last agreed to meet the men in conference. Why? Because Mr Reid, the Premier, a man who is in a high station because he has tho confidence of his fellow-citizens, mediates between them and the men. It is only another way of saying that they would very much liko to have a properly constituted Board of Conciliation, with some man of standing at its head to arrange all differences after hearing both

sides. The last phase of the Newcastle trouble has proved tho samo thing as the lirst, viz., the vital necessity for a compulsory Arbitration Act. 1 n the lirst tho facts pointed the moral. In the second the employers admitted its correctness. 'Throughout the whole story the men, as they have been ready to confer with tho other side, have from the lirst been for the moral.

Tho Italian rout at Adowa seems to have been exaggerated. The Shoans, we must remember, are said to have got home, and routed the Italian troops, who, after they were jammed together on ground too narrow for them, cleared the situation by bolting. 'That is tlm story. But whenever an enemy is routed by savage warriors at close quarters very few ever escape. Now, a great many of the Italians did escape, and ever since that day their enemy has left them alone; he has even offered them a boundary. Had tho enemy been of tho tribes of “ Fuzzy- Wuzzy,” the end might have been different.

By the way, talking of “ Fuzzy-Wuzzy,” not the least of the strange things of these days is the disciplining of the Arab tribes by British ollicors in the invasion of the Soudan. It lias often been suggested that under military discipline these Arabs would be a powerful force for anyone wishing to conquer Africa, Here is the discipline beginning in the Soudan. The French have tried Die same thing with gond results in Algeria, Indeed, their Ttireos and Spaliis have diet inguishod themselves on European ball lelields.

Thus it may come to pass that when the Englishman from Cairo shakes hands with the Englishman from Zanzibar, if will really be t he Arab of Nubia and the Soudan shaking hands with t In- Sikh or the Pal hail from India, both under the British Hag.

Four young hoys got on hoard the s.s. Akaroa at Auckland during tho temporary absence of thu watchman and started the engines going. The tow lines parish, and alter just missing a collision with a barque, the steamer crushed into tho wharf, ’1 he steamer’s boat was wrecked, and part ol the bulwarks damaged. A piece of land in the city of Christchurch, IT; perches, has been set apart for the Canterbury Society ol Arts lor an Art Gallerv. A tract ol hind, block No. 5, ilautapu Survey District, Wellington, is gazetted as set apart lor the Ohutu improved tarm pedal settlement.