EDITORIAL NOTES AND COMMENTS.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XXII, Issue 6791, 16 January 1897, Page 1

EDITORIAL NOTES AND COMMENTS.

It is said that, in Piccadilly, there is to be a Millionaire Club, to which, according to the paragraph from which we derive the information, " many persons will probably belong in order to persuade the public that they are millionaires." The annual subscription is to be a hundred guineas. This will be a gilt-edged variety of Mendicant Club. Persons who desire to play upon the sympathies and credulity of the public so that they may rub along without honest toil—"live on their wits," as the saying goes—may accomplish their purpose just as effectually by professing to be rich as by posing as miserable wretches, famished and out-at-elbows. Who has not met the polite person of the "Don'tcberknow" species—the gentleman who carries all his belongings on an organism too delicately nurtured to earn bread to keep burning within it the fire of ultrarespectability and aristocratic lineage. This individual belongs to a Millionaire Club of his own. He lives on expectation and the honest sweat of other people's brows, which poetic sentiment It was a part of his education to learn to honor, when at school. But there is an endless assortment of Millionaire Clubblsts most of which have no charter. There are the reputable citizens who belong to institutions which, trusted by the public because of the assumed honor of their members, are allowed to incur debts that are never paid, the members who incurred the debts having drifted out of the Institutions or the institutions having sunk altogether out of sight. Worthy persons who would scorn to practise dishonesty are thus the means of cheating tradesmen who have trusted the institutions because they have had confidence in those persons. Oamaru is not clear of this stigma. Numerous societies have come and gone leaving the trail of repudiation behind. Then there is the patriotic and enthusiastic citizen, who, desiring to see his town achieve the distinction and advantage of some scheme which requires money, or credit, pledges himself to assist to indemnify one of his fellows if he will only become responsible for the necessary amount, but who, when the affair is over, Ignores his obligation and leaves his associate to sufter all the loss. Again, we regret to have to say, Oamara has offenders in this respect. Those for whom these hints are intended will understand our meaning, and we trust that a fulfilment of their responsibilities will render it unnecessary to refer to the subjects with more definiteness. They are shams as contemptible as the remittance man who parades all his respectability on his back and on his tongue to lure tradesmen into embalming bis name in their ledgers. These seductive Millionaires are a greater / nuisance and danger to society than burglars, who may be baired out, or professional beggars.

There seems to be a strong probability that something approaching concerted international actipn will be taken witb a view to maintaining a uniform wheat at a uniform value. The method by which it is proposed to attain this end is by State storage of the surplus in the years cf plenty for use in years of short supply, and the good hoped to be secured is partly in the interest of consumers and partly for the benefit of producers. Germany has already made a movement in the direction indicated, a law having been passed limiting speculative transactions in wheat, much to the chagrin of the various corn exchanges, which, as we have lately learned by cable, are strongly protesting against the operation of the statute. In Great Britain many Conservatives are advocating the erection of State granaries for the storage wheat, as a precautionaiy measure in the event of war and as a step towards fixing a minimum price for wheat to the English agriculturists—a somewhat significant suggestion to find favor in freetrade England, especially as it is coupled with a proposal to levy an import duty upon foreign grain. Whether or not either the course taken in Germany or that mooted in England, or even both in combination, would produce any material effect of a permanent character is highly problematical. It is, however, interesting to note these movements because they convey a cleiar indication that the trend of public' opinion is in the direction of rendering the food supplies of the people in some measure independent of capricious leather and the power of moneyed speculators, and to infuse into wheat production a much-needed element of certainty, as to price at least. The most important and comprehensive project in connection with the world's wheat supply is said to have erftanated from Russia. According to the Washington Post of a recent date, the Czar's Ministers have made overtures to all the principal wheat-growing countries of the world —the United States of America, Great Britain, the Argentine Republic, and Austria—to take combined action to give to wheat a fixed value. The idea is that the nations should come to an agreement to fix a price for wheat that should be operative in all seasons whether of over-production or shortage in the yields—in fact, to make the value of the principal grain almost as unchangeable as gold itself has become. As to the means by which it is thought to reach the end desired wo have no information. Probably the details are left to be evolved by a suggested International Wheat Conference. Until something more definite is disclosed it would be of little practical good to enter upon an examination of the proposal. It is sufficient for the present to record the fact that thinking men in all countries are becoming impressed with the necessity for regulating in some way the value of the chief article of food.