ROUND THE CORNERS.

New Zealand Times, Volume LI, Issue 8525, 3 November 1888, Page 3

ROUND THE CORNERS.

U'mm the Neii Zealand Mail, October 26. v f Half-', ruths tvid for a propose ora worse than lies clirect. Tho misleading of the latter is far mora easy of detection, for it is not veiled by an air of plausibility ; and a straight going lie -does imt gall the pt raon attacked half »o much as a haif-tmth. He can make the lie as a lie clear in a moment, while the hall-truth requires ■more or less explanation. I should think the writer who put together the introduction to those legal opinions that were published in the Post last Friday was an adept at half-truth tolling, and possibly a champion liar besides. Never was a more contemptible statement put into print, and the writer knew it as he wrote it. Somebody wanted a cat to be belled and tried it on with the newspapers to do it for nothing and lay themselves open to the charge of unfair journalism. If the opinions bad been put in OB ordinary correspondence upon the understanding that the name of the putter-in might ■be divulged if asked for, why then the newapapersmighthave published without hesitation; •or as an advertisement, when the name of the nerson who delivered and paid for it could be .disclosed if aiked for. But for newspapers to be asked to take upon their shoulders the red hot grievances of other people and father them, and makeunto themselves a host of enemies, thereby —is just too much of a good thing, even for the complacent newspapers of New Zealand. We have got to draw the line somewhere. Enemies will of course be made by not doing it. And it is better to make enemies in doing business legitimately than illegitimately.

1 think newspapers might be a little generous one towards another —occasionally. J ust throw in a grain or two of magnanimity now and then when very palpable opportunity presents itself. Such an opportunity, for instance, as the Post had when those legal opinions were advertised. The Post knew full well that the two other papers had declined to publish on the very same grounds that the Post itself had declined to publish when the opinions were first tendered to it. And yet the Post allowed those flaming half-truths to appear in its advertising columns without a little local of explanation in another place. How gracefully that little local would have read ! Of a verity, the Post would have been quoted as something like a newspaper, ar d its contemporaries would have owed it a good torn.

The establishment of a foreign parcels post was inevitable. It had to come sooner or later, and on the whole we have it fairly sooner, all things considered, But will it be an unmixed blessing ? It is very nice and comfortable to be able to send or receive parcels up to eleven .pounds weight to and from all places outside New Zealand, but how will it be likely to affect trade? A parcel weighing eleven pounds might contain two or three suits of clothes, or several pairs of boots, or a lot of stationery, or even a lot of drapery, and hence an opening is presented of doing trade direct with places outside of New Zealand if sixpence or a shilling can be made by it. Local industry is placed somewhat in peril by this new parcels post, and it is to be hoped will not suffer through it. He who loves the country that keeps him will not desert its industries for the sake of a shilling or two of saving. N ever was there a time when, aa now, the welfare of the country so much demanded the shoulder to shoulder business among New Zealanders, I bold it to be a sin to give the go-bye to the local tailor, or shoemaker, or stationer, or draper, for the sake of what may be termed the .European “fad.’> There is plenty in this country quite good enough for true New Zealanders without going so far afield to fancy markets. It is to be hoped the parcels post will not prove a disagreeable diversion of legitimate trade into illegitimate channels.

And to this the Colony has come, has it? The sweating system ! And so early too ! Not half a century old yet! and but the other day quoted as a veritable paradise for the working person. I may observe that for the purposes of this act the word “ person ” is either masculine or feminine. It seems to me, however, that in connection with sweating it will be oftener feminine than masculine, for it is on the shoulders of poor women that the sweating harden falls the heaviest. I grieve deeply that the statements from Otago about the prevalence of grimly cheap labour seem to be irrefutable. It reads like an echo from London. Flannel shirts made for 8d a dozen. Great Scott! what next ?' Is it possible we have fallen so low as that? That the terrible disease has laid hold on us. And it is hard to grapple with, for it is essentially endemic ; intensely democratic. There is nothing of the aristocrat about sweating. A bloodsucker of the Demos type fastens on another Demos and takes it out of her or him as the case may be. I don’t mean to say that the bloodsucking is all done by the middle man. Not a bit of it. The people who buy the cheap clothing and glory in their bargains are—unknown to themselves it may be bloodsuckers also. A mother dresses her little son or little daughter in a nicely made suit of clothes or dress, “ Oh, so cheap, my dear, only 4s 9d ”; little recking, never thinking, of the blood and bones grinding that produced those cheap articles.

The evil of sweating, for it is an evil and a deadly one, can only be dealt with by the people themselves organising to modify it. We have ladies’ Christian associations, young girls’ friendly societies and so on, and now what is wanted is mothers’ unions all over the land to deal with purely domestic matters, the training of children, the management of husbands, and the discountenancing of traffic in the bodies and souls of their fellow creatures. It is quite possible for clothing to be too cheap, and no one knows better how to price things than the experienced housekeeper. And when Homemade clothing is retailed “ almost for nothing ” it is a sure sign there is misery and starvation somewhere that wants ferreting out. The average workingman holds his own very well in New Zealand and Australia, but there are hundreds of poor women who can’t, and don’t. And it Is ont of such that cheap clothing is sweated. I hope my readers will bear this in ■mind and not dance for joy when they happen ■to suit themselves with an extraordinarily cheap line in home-made clothing. For there is, in ■nine oases out of ten, despair wrapped up in ■the folds of it.

I grieve to say the New Zealand Mail is in some danger. Actuated by the best of intentions an d we know where that old dogmatist, who wrote more than a book, a whole dictionary, said they led to—the editress of the “ Ladies’ Page ” opened a “ Friendly Exchange ” column as a vehicle for the ventilation of views and •experiences on cooking and cognate subjects. By the way, I notice that one writer has been ■cooking wives lately 5 serving ’em up hot and ■hot in a variety of ways. And now another steps in, and, under the pseudonym of “Penelope ” —how suggestive ! pitches into the wife critic and declares the “ Exchange ’’ column wants widening out, and proposes a controversy in it as 'to whether Shakespeare really wrote the plays attributed to him. There, the secret is out, and in it lies the danger to the popular weekly. For coaid it survive such a discussion ? l am afraid not, and from that and theological disquisitions, the good Lord deliver it. There seems to me, however, to be a strong touch of sarcasm in the proposition. After the criticisms of wives comes the deluge of Ben -Johnson and lope ? ” I commend her remarks to my readers.

Acorrespondent discourses below. He is right about the blunder in tbe last verse but one, and There give the corrections—“ Children and

the building of a city, continue a man’s name, J but a blameless Hfe i- co i.tal above them j both,” Mv Dealt Aiom:.v-,;s. ■ vli.ny thanlu for Hie quo- J tations from Tho I'-eac -«f. Bns in wlnit runn.er of Bibles now-a-d.yi li tine Book of [• ccJesL-stlctia to be ' found ? The verse mieut coving and selling made a deep j impression on me many year ago as a quotation in (t think) a sermon of Bishop Wils on An Anglican clo.-gvinaa, not an illiterate one. had > o knowledge j of it when I spoke of its, unfortunately, ever incre..sing truth. Is not an argument to be found in it in | favour of deminishiug the number c.f those intervening between producer and consumer—by encouraging local industries, co-operation, &c?—l have so used it. ln our day, The Preacher would probably have used the quartz slicking between the slates as an illustration/ Verbum sap. Of course “ wife ” is a rather droll blunder for life In the last verse but one.—&.B. AbMODKlia.