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Otago Daily Times, Issue 17321, 22 May 1918, Page 4

It is to be regretted that Mr Howard Elliott has not taken the opportunity at any of the meetings which he has addressed under the auspices of the Protestant Political Association to -withdraw, and offer a suitable apology, for the atrocious imputation that was cast by him m one of his "censored" letters last year' upon the memory of a nun. That the officers and members, of the Protestant Political Association seem not to recognise so long as Mr Elliott retains the position of its organiser, that body itself shares the reproach which Mr Elliott has attached to his own name in connection with this disgraceful business is astonishing to us. While the introduction of sectarian issues at all into the public life of the community must be abhorrent to the minds of, we should suppose, most people, there must also be a very strong feeling' throughout the dominion that the presence at the head of the Protestant Political Association of the slanderer of tho character of a dead woman who was a member of a sacred order constitutes a serious reflection upon propriety. Mr Elliott did make a reference at His Majesty's Theatre on Monday night to the disgusting affair; but it was not a reference that revealed him to be in any degree more sensible of the moral wrong which he committed than he had previously shown himself to be. It is a mere quibble that it was not by himself that the libel on- the dead nun was published. It is a quibble that does not clear hini of the odium of having placed a foul stigma upon the character of that nun. His evidently studied refusal to make a publio expression of humble sorrow for the gross offence of which he was guiltv necessarily deprives him of the respect of the most fair-minded people.

The answer which we have been able to secure to the pertinent question of a correspondent, respecting the appointment of a member of the City Council to a position in the corporation employment, is by no means satisfactory. The fact that the appointment was not advertised is explained in the statement that the position is one of £ kind which the heads of corporation departments are empowered to fill on their own authority. The public will readily perceive that the heads of departments must enjoy the power of engaging casual labour when it is necessary" to do so. But was this a temporary appointment of a casual hand? The circumstances connected with the appointment seem to negative any such su<r. gestion. We should judge from them that the city councillor had the advantage of knowing of tho occurrence of the vacancv or of the existence of an opportunity for securing employment i n this corporation department, and that, having made sure of the appointment without apparently having had to encounter any competition, he simply stepped into it from his seat in the council. If this be so, the appointment is of a class that comes perilously close to meriting the description of a job. The appointee may possess many qualifications for the position he has secured, but, if it was woxth the sacrifice of a seat in the City Council to gain the position, wo should say that the position is one for which competition should have been invited. And if competition had been invited, and other applicants not less qualified than the city councillor had offered themselves for it, it may reasonably be argued thai the appointment should have been conferred on on e of those other applicants in preference to a property-owner •too was a member of the City Council whea th* position lird to bo fflW.

A mhssagk of hope for hundreds of thousands of people is conveyed in the cabled statement that an Italian professor has discovered a cure for tuberculosis. It has too often happened in the past that announcements (havo been prematurely, and, as it eventually turned out. erronoously made that scientists have, as the result of laborious research, discovered the means whereby specified diseases may bn either prevented or cured, i' or this reason, the report of the latest discovcrv is one upon which it would be unwise to build very great expectations. We know nothing as yet of the tests upon which the claim to the discovery is based, nor do we know to what extent, if any, tho claim is accepted by competent authorities as valid. If a euro for tuberculosis has actually been discovered, the announcement of it is the most gratifying which it has beeij the privilege of the press to circulate for many a day, and it will bring a new and intensely cheering light into the lives of vast numbers of human sufferers. The death-rate from tuberculosis is heavy throughout the whole world. Although the mortality rate is distinctly more favourable in New Zealand than it is in tho United Kingdom, where it exceeds 10 per cent, of the total death rate, and although it compares favourably with that in most parts of Australia, tuberculosis ranks second to cancer as the disease that is most destructive of life in the dominion. It is, however, even more serious than cancer in the sense that the mortality due to it is spread over all age periods, whereas cancer is a disease of late or comparatively late life. Thus, while the average age at death from cancer in the fifteen years ended with 1916 was 63 years for males and 59 for females, the average ages in the case of deaths from tuberculosis w'&re 34 years and 29 years respectively, so that tuberculosis cost the country an infinitely greater amount of human life than cancer did. It will be with the deepest interest that the whole world will look for further information respecting the great claim that a cure for this terrible scourge has been discovered.

The tributes paid in the English press and in Parliament to the memory of Mr John Redmond lacked no glow of spontaneous warmth. The personal attractiveness of tho departed leader, his notable intellectual gifts, and his consistent devotion to his principles of public duty were earnestly emphasised; and there was also a keen recognition of the pathetic irony, so to speak, of his removal at a vital juncture in Irish affairs. All parties and classes united in grateful remembrance of his patriotic attitude at the beginning of the war, when ho helped so splendidly to defeat the enemy's expectation, still cherished, of internal dissension; and it was truly said that "nothing that has happened since in Ireland can in the least detract from the incomparable service which Mr Redmond rendered when in August, 1914, he took all risks for this great and generous decision." In an admirable speech in the House of Commons, Mr Lloyd George declared it to be "one of the tragedies of a land of tragedies" that John Redmond had been struck down before having the ultimate opportunity of using his powers of sagacious statesmanship in Irish government. Special interest attached to Sir Edward Carson's tribute. The Ulster leader recalled far-off days of early association as barristers on the Leinster circuit, and went on to say :

Tho Prime Minister has said that Mr Redmond was engaged in one of tho fiercest controversies of modern times in this House. For 25 years I have been prominently identified with that controversy, and I can say with absolute sincerity that during the whole of that period I cannot recall to mind one single bitter personal word that ever passed between John Redmond and myself Only this morning, when I heard of his "death, I could not help calling to mind two small instances which tho House will allow me to state. Tho llouso will .recollect that just before the outbreak of the war, when tho political situation in Ireland was moat threatening, his Majesty the King summoned us to a conference at Buckingham Palace. The conference lasted two, or throe days, and then unfortunately broko up without any result, and I remember John Redmond coming up to me as wo passed out of the gates of tho palace and saying—"For the sake of the old times on tho Leinster circuit, let us have a good! shake hands," and, Mr Speaker, we had.