NOTES

Otago Daily Times, Issue 14281, 1 August 1908, Page 6

NOTES

t However great (lie sin and folly of strikes, nobody can refiifc jjity to the Sydney _ strikers. They went 'out with ostentation, they como back in ignominy, fl Ono day the word \s No Surrender!—and « tlve strike leaders are omnipotent; next y, day tiio same leaders are tunning for their tl •lives and the rank and file are tumbling „ over each other as .applicants for reinstatement. Nobody desires to fee any class of men humiliated in this fiishion. f.; How much of self-respect can be left them? a Wo do these tilings much better in, New « Zealand. The Auckland tramways strike t! was comparatively a small thing, but we coddkdi it and cockered it by the sympathetic ministrations of this 'official pereonago and that, until wc made it, morally, a big tiiug and a triumphant success. To aecommoda.ts the whimsies of these Auckland strikers a fancy court was set up for tho trial of Hieir grievances, and the decision of this court, bringing the Tramway Company down to its marrowbones, liaa shocked the common sense of everybody outside the labour unions. Ono point, said to be especially grievous, is that a man may not bo dismissed without reason given. But here 1 fail to Mow. Where is the grievance? You aro not bound to find a reason satisfactory to the man dismissed!. What is to hinder your pleading incompatibility of, temper?—a plea, wliich before now has availed even *] in the Divorce Court. Or you can say « that you like this inau much, but that you <; would like another man better. Or that you do not like him at all, but cannot tell why. 1; I do not like thee, Dr Poll, j The reason why I cannot tell, i But this at least I luiow full well, li I do not like thae, Dr Poll. t Adapted for use in industrial relationsliina a this might be a .pattern formula of dig- t charge. Why should it not satisfy tie ° conditions of Dr M'Arthur'e fantastic ! award? St t The Church of England is certainly a peculiar institution. At ono end of the ' scale are b'ehops and archbishop. in \ palaces; at the other are curates " passing k rich on forty pounds a year," and a Church Socialist League which, as ( described by its advocates, " challenges 'j Society at its base." Apropos of bishops j in palicffi, there is a story of Dr Temple, J last Bishop of London, a tough old gentleman of precise habits, who would sometimes take a cab home to Fulham Palace , and then hand the driver bis exact legal . fare. "Bishop," said cabby on one occa- ] fiioii, "if St. Paid were in London do yon ( think he would be at Fulham on. £10,000 , a year?" "No," said the bishop; "he ( would be at-Lambeth on £15,000."- I find ■ no fault with this smart answer, nor have ] I any difficulty in believing that a big ) episcopal income usually melts away in j episcopal expenditure quite as big, and j fatally inevitable. Be that as it may, one 1 doesn't easily eoe how the Pan-Anglican , Congress of mi trod dignitaries ,wi't ; h • princely revenues could hold terms with « the Church Socialist League, which, in i alliance with _ the Independent Labour Party, was simultaneously ranting and raving at meetings in Church House, Bean's Yard, Westminster—a cloistered retreat hitherto sacred to the primmest of Church gatherings, trodden chiefly by mild-eyed melancholy lotos-eaters, the world •forgetting, by the world forgot,. Evidently this order of things is ended. One speaker', a clergyman, alfirmed that the Socialist League -was there " to arrest the evils of private l ownership of land and capital." Another, a' layman, " walked into " the King for hob-nobbing with the Czar: _" Hora w* have the highest representative of England, th« King,'shaking hsatls with a tyrant in the li«ht oi Christendom—(" Shams!" and hisaes.) You are right; it is a shame. The Cue has shot his people in cold blood—(Cries oi " Murdororl") I protest as a citizen and IB a. Christia,n.—(Applause.) When the King goes he must not go as reprcsen- ; t-ativo of tho counitry, but roprosonting the King only"—at wliieh declaration there was loud applause. ' Theso sentiments are to me as midsummer , madness; but apparently they have,their , place its a phase of Church of England life. , Putting this and that togethor, the bishops and the Socialists, I conclude that the Church ds a remarkably elastic institution. The Gibson-Smith heresy case, though young as yet, promises well, A certain " Carpus" appears to have elected .himself Chief Inquisitor, entering upon his duties in the spirit proper to that historic office and with the long-windedness of a Cameronian hill-preacber. A column of the Daily Times wherein to bestow his tediousness upon us is not sufficient for him. Personally I have little reason to complain, for he devotes part of 'his space to a Passing Note of mine 20 years old—May 5, 1888—hoping thereby to show that in judging an alleged heretic 20 years back I had less of Christian charity than I have now. Which is another way of saying that I have more now than I had then. Instead, however, of congratulating me on this growth in grace evidenced by the kindly sentiments of my last week's Note on Gibson-Smith, "Carpus" would refer it to spiritual baeksliding, or possibly to senile decay. The earlier state was the better. But as it happens, " Carpus" is wrong on the question of fact, and wrong in a way that argues a curious code of ethics. The heresy incident of 20 years back was the publication of a pamphlet entitled "The Beign of Grace," the author of which pamplilet—a well-known Presbyterian minister—" Carpus," with fine reserve, designates "Mr Blank." In the resurrected Passing Note I appeal" to be saying the most painful things oi Mr Blank —things after "Garpus's" own heart,— attributing to him motives the vilest; whon, lo! you come on a sentence which transforms the whole situation : Thus, in substance, one of my correspondents, giving ntteiuico to thoughts which sue simmering just now, I dare say, k the minds of many amongst his co-religionists. I am not of his opinion, and quote him to eontiadiot him. What 'the ingenuous "Carpus" hoped to gaiu by attributing to me sentiments which I repudiated in the very act of quoting them, it lemuins for him to say. I Twenty years ago, then, I was the j same incorrigibly tolerant " Cms" that I I am to-day. Here I might dismiss my ani tiqiiarian friend; but his proceedings are intrinsically amusing, and I can afford him another paragraph. Erom the ancient Passing Note he quotes he has excised, he says, a few sentences. Yes,— and he has excised them with such judgment that in the end I actually seem to be tailing-on to the pack of heresyhunters. Let mo then restore the passage to its original form, keeping up the affectation of naming no names. Regard for the interests of the Kirk may have kept Mr Blank silent whilßt ho was teaching theology. He didn't want to bo the occasion of a scandal— and tho trial of <i Illogical tutor for heresy would have been a scandal to set the hair of universal Presbytery on end. Now thai he is, little iuotc tusui » layman, Mr Blank may say what he likes, and take the consequences. There need ba no scandal; there need only bo a row. 1 I distinguish, you observe; a row is not necessarily a scandal; else how esplan the conduct of those who are going to juke the row—the Rev. Double-blank, who has written a fierce letter to tho Times, and the H«v. Blanktrty-blan!;, who presumably is grinding up his scalping knifo in private—and tho rest? Would Iheso good men make a scandal? Certainly not; but an ecclesiastical row is as little immoral as a football match, and quite as exhilarating. That is the Blunkety-blank view, I opine, and from the point of view oi this column I concur in it. My sympathies go with those )i'.:nib::s of Presbytery whose feelings at this moment are those oi Job's warhorse when lit sinelleth the battle afar oft, the noise of the captains, and the shouting. Explaining to "Carpus" the nature of irony were, perhaps, labour in vain. Permit me, instead, to remark that in the " lleign of Grace" controversy I was y altogether on the suit of the" angels— "i rejoicing over oho sinner that repented of doctrines dishonouring w religion, and fearing to trend where Presbyteries and other wise folk i.isiiel in lo condemn the penitent, partly for repenting, but chiefly for repenting, at the. wrong . time and 1 place. Here 1 bethujk myself that

Carpus is a Now Testament name. Let me quote tlie one place where it occurs • The clolio that T left at Troas with Carpus, when lliou comest bring with theo, and the books, but especiully the parchments. On tin's T venture to remark that the "elok'e" left in the keeping of Carpus was not a cloak of hypocrisy, and to hope that when the apostle got back his documents he got them back unmutilated. It is easier to begin a Burns discussion than to get it ended. Here ia another authority on the passage cited in Blackwood as an especial crux—a couplet from the Address to the Dcil: An' dawtet,. twal-pint Hstwkie's gane As yell's the- bill. Dear " Civis,"—Ycer freen at Greymonth, has, I dootna, din his best to m&k 1 intelligible to English fork your quotation frao Burns last week; dawted, means petted, and twa.ll means twelve; but when he says a pint is pint, he's athegither wring, and utterly destroys Hawlrie's character as a milker wi' onybody that kens aboot coos; ono pint Scotch is equal to four English pints, and means half a gallon; a' barren roos are yeid, but it disaa follow that a' yold coos are barren; if so there would soon be an end o' tho coo family,—it simply moans dry as far as milk is concerned, The neatest sense I can gi 0 it in English w/nild bo; And petted six gall'n Hawkie'a gono as dric's the bull.—Yours, Scotiy. The point bere is the pint, and a, pint Scottish, it seems, is four pints English So, when Burns calls out— Go, fetch to me a pint o' wine, he means half a gallon. Tliia is depressing intelligence, but I suppose we must receive it. ihe enormity of the Scottish pint liquid measure, lias doubtless left profound traces w the national character. Especially when coupled witliHho peculiarities of the boottish pound. A pound Scottish was one-twelfth of a pound English-namely Is Bdl the 20 pennies in that sum bein« Scottish shillings! Which fact may help to explain the national sensitiveness on the subject of bawbees. 1 make these remarks without prejudice, being in large part, and that perhaps the bettor part, facottish myself. The British footballers have gone away defeated, and that they -couldn't help There was no need, however, that thev should go away disgraced. But when their manager, Mr Harnett, ends as a common slanderer, disgrace it is, and there is no gcttuig away from the fact. As to the rampant drunkenness Mr Harnett alleges against Livorcargill, a town under NoLiccnse, he is aptly answered by the First , Church, minister, the Kev, Mr Ferguson who says roundly that the British team drank more than was good for them, and 'would have scored move points if tW had consumed fewer pints." Conceivably their pints were ,of the Scotch variety, and we have just learned that the pint Scottish is half a gallon. To the villainous libel which the same Mr Harnett launches against Dunedin the fitting reply is not available, Mr Harnett being upon the liigh seas. On this subject " A Father of Girls " writes as follows: — Bear " Civis/'-Did this escape your eagle eye, 03 it seems to have done the editors of our local papers? Are we to sit quiet while this man who calls him,aelf a gentleman takes a licking so badly ■that be waits till he gets a thousand miles away from us, and on the eve of departure for other shores, and 1 then fires this put»g *w>t at-ua? I -ventoe to say that if lie had made, the assertion as to the immorality of Dunedin after the fust match here, a second match would not have come off, and a public ducking would have taken its place. Surely someone should take an early opportunity of protesting against such statements beiii-r circulated not only through N.Z., but throughout Australia and Great Britain I believe " swelled head " had a good deal to do with it. The natural "hero worship of a few children has been construed by ovil minds into something worse. It wouldi be interesting to know why tile Englishmen fell overboard at Auckland!! Air Harnett has gone; presumably he does not mean to return; If he should sav that we think him a slanderer'and mendacious, we'will not be at the trouble to deny the allegation; we will limit ourselves to a 1 regret that we are denied an opportunity of kicking the a'llegator. Cms.