PEN-NOTES AND PENCILLINGS.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1509, 31 January 1901, Page 60

PEN-NOTES AND PENCILLINGS.

Yes, make it- jump, the rider is accomplished The, world expects the playing of a trumb. touch her up, there's plenty merfct-lo in her, WeVe got to show the kangaroo can “jump.” and the cry is ope of long applaudA. ... big,. . , .... ... We*ye passed the time of writing and of “stump,” Henceforth it’s work, a constant state of. .'• . .. going, And going, let us hope, right from the jump/ 5

WOMEN AGRICULTURISTS

Lady Warwick has had £-50,000 left us for her farms. It is » -big sum intended for a big undertaking. Lady Warwick is reputedSjr one of the handsomest women in England'; so far as usefulness is concerned she has no superior. A few years ago she inaugurated her system of agricultu-

rail ooileges for women, and this lias grown to such an extent that economists are giving it attention from all parts of the florid. Hostels she calls them, and months ago shehad a number of ; these:, and the work done by their tutors, was generally acknowledged as of incalwalable benefit. Twelve months’ develop-, ment showed an increase in acreage of four hundred per cent., and in memberAip of about the same. This is the class of work that lias been maintained to date, t£nd the result is, it has led te a world appreciation and—£so,ooo in a single donation.

BEER-

The report of poisoned beer has had a most disastrous effect on the brewing tde in says a contemporary.- © temperance people argued for a century and didn’t accomplish through weir thousand orators what “inferior sugar feas done in a single week. It was not a long scare, but it was a big one, and the. result has been a shrinkage both in the consumption at home and in the demand from abroad. The chief sufferer has naturally been the brewery having most to lose—Bass’s at Burton-on-Trent. Bass’s is the most wonderful affair of its kind fo tile world, filling, indeed, the life of a

And now, Mr Barton, the world expects you to make it jump

complete township. Burton is a city of 50,000 inhabitants, and all of them are associated in some way with brewing, and,

as a consequence with Bass. The turnout of Bass’s is stupendous, equalling 1,500,000 barrels a year and 25,000,000 bottlers. The head of this remarkable firm is Lord Burton, who was raised to the Peerage under that title a few years' ago.

A GREAT ENGLISHMAN

The death of Lord Armstrong is of world-wide importance. He was one of the moving spirits in the inventive life of his country, and he figured in that- way for over sixty years. The son of a merchant of Newcastle-on-Tyne, ho was born in 1810 j and educated a® a solicitor* .a For

a time he practised his profession, but eventually his scientific bent led him to discard -we law for the bench of the demonstrator. While still a mere lad he invented the hydraulic crane, and a little later the accumulator by which an artificial head is substituted for the natural one gained only by altitudes. These inventions he applied in so many directions that to particularise them all would wellnigh be impossible. In 1854 lie invented the remarkable cannon which bears lus name, and which, indirectly, led to bis

being appointed engineer of rifled ordinance and given a knighthood. - In 1,863 he resigned his position to enter into business on the large scale represented by the Elswick Mannfacfcuring Company, now one of the largst affairs of the kind in the world.

THE COMMONWEALTH ODE^

A great deal of fun been made out of the Commonwealth Ode, but the successful competitor, Mr Geo. Essex Evans, can survive it. True, the verses wore composed for quite another object, having appeared in the “Australasian” a- couple of months ago, but they are none the worse for this circumstance, and are possibly better aa the result of “time.” The fact is, Mr Evans’s Ode is one. of the

most graceful things we have seen since Henry Sendai composed the cantata for the exhibition of 1879. There is not a single weak line in the whole seventy-two, divided into six verses, while there are many which are really beautiful.

THE RED CROSS

The news that the Queen intends to create another order calls to notice the orders.that exist already. These, as is well known, are many, but they only exist in the majority of cases for men. Women are neglected in this as in many othfh' things, and prove by their disabili-

ties that we are not necessarily so enlightened as we claim to be. The chief Order enjoyed by women of British Empire is the Red Cross, which was initiated by the Queen in 1883 “for seal and devotion in ministering to and nursing sick and wounded soldiers and sailors,” with the Army in the field, in hospital, or on board ship. What- the Victoria- Cross is to men the Red Gross is to women—the sign, of signs, that has valour for its credential and honour for those who are born of the recipient. Among the most distinguished wearers of the Red Cross are Miss Florence Nightingale and Lady Roberts.

ONE OF THE FEDERAL CHIEFS.

Not many knighthoods came to Australia this New Year, but those that did were eminently deserved. A very appropriate selection was that of Sir John Quick, of Victoria. A Cornishman by birth, Sir John has been resident- in the southern colony since 1852, and his present high position in the esteem of his fellow Australians is simply the result of his own unflagging perseverance. Successively compositor, reporter, and barrister, lie has, : indeed, played many, and diverse parts, but the work which makes him a representative of Australia. is able advocacy of Federation. Although an old Parliamentary hand in his own province, he was not too- w r ell

known in the other colonies until the time of the Corowa Convention, when, as the moving spirit; of that- assemblage i he! burst upon public attention as one

of the most earnest and capable Federal leaders of the day. This was considered by many persons as the turning point in the national question, or rather ar the terminal point of theoretical Federartion, and the commencing soint of practical union. It was from this time that the public were able to separate the sheep from a certain other classical denomination), or, to quote from an alleged humorist of the time, to distinguish between the Federally Quick and the Fed L erallv dead. Sir John Quick, had chance willed it, might have been in a position when the plucking of the fruit commenced 1 , to accept a portfolio in the Federal Ministry, but precedence of claim having to bo recognised in this ®sS other things, he lias been distinguished? by his -Sovereign with the honour of a knighthood. 1 - t

A main with 'a. great opportunity ; just-, now is Mr Trenwith; Minister for Wojfe in Victoria. -To him has fallen the task ' of making the necessary “show 1 ” arrangements in connection with the forthcoming Royal visit. In on© thing he has risen to the position, and in another failed. He considers that the opening

of the Federal Parliament by the Duke of York should be cn as grand a scale as the- inauguration cf Federation in Sydney, and has declared that Melbourne will- rise to the occasion by making an unprecedented demonstration. In that view Mr Trenwith deserves to be supported and encouraged, as while the celebrations in Sydney were to signalise the birth of the Comm on weal th.Jdiose in Melbourne will have to emphasise the birth of the Commonwealth's Parliament. No less for the Duke of York than for the honour of the opening of the first Australian Parliament, The decorations ;for Melbourne in March or April next should he as new. .as possible, arid thus made appropriate to the newness of the occasion. . V’. '

SOMEONE WHO MAY BAY SOMB- . THING. -I >• . \ .

It is probable the forthcoming" Royal visit will bring in it® train a far .larger number of Imperial, and foreign, visitors

than came to the celebrations in Sydney. The Dominion of r Canada qyilh,! iibi ’April Hex to, send a specially .sUertxii ted representative. most likely, says a cablegram, Sir rSandford Fleming;.? This gentleman was one of the great progressional party in Canada many years ago,- was a central figure in the best period 1 of its political development and stands in the list of about- a dozen great men of the Dominion now. This knight paid a visit -to Newcastle, N.S.W., in the company of Sir Mackenzie Bowpll, a few years a&'G. Sir Saiunord Fleming i® a moving spirit in a country which has grappled' with the problem of a differential tariff, the question of .practical' Imperial sympathy and the difficulty of carrying on, under those circusmtanoes, with a foreign country of overwhelming superior opportunities and infinitely greater resources,... of population and trade. ; ‘ .