FROM NORTH OF TWEED.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18802, 3 March 1923, Page 18

FROM NORTH OF TWEED.

A LETTER TO SCOTTISH EXILES. Written for the Otngo Daily Times by Robbiit S. Angus. EDINBURGH, January 11. Not for many years, have wo had such a good-going tight on any public question as that which is now in progress over the proposal to make Edinburgh Cue tie tho site of tho Scottish National War Memorial. It has bean simmering tor many months, and every time that it seems likely to die down Lord Rosebery, from his fastness at Tho Durdans, Epsom, stirs it up again. He is the chief opponent ot the sciieme, and has no love tor the Duke of Atholl, who has been its chief promoter, and has collected nearly £130,000 tor the purpose. Some people suspect that if Lord Rosebery had been consulted about the scheme before it was announced to tho public he would have viewed it with a more friendly eye. However that may be, it is evident that though physically a cripple, he is mentally as keen as over. In his latest letter ho has described the proposed memorial as being “like a jolly-mould,” and tho derisive phrase may bo more effective for its purpose than much solid argumentation. It soius, however, a hard saying about a design by Sir Robert Lorimer, who is admittedly our foremost architect. Lord Rosebery has tho support, shrill and abusive, of Lady Frances Balfour, Sir Herbert Maxwell, and many others, while against himi are Lord Salveson and Mr P. J. Ford, M.P., and there is a host of anonymous and psoudononymous controversialists about equally divided. The Office of Works, which has the custody of tho Castle, has issued a tepid pronouncement, evidently afraid to commit itself until it has counted the heads.

In view of the feeling excited, it seems difficult to proceed with tho scheme. Even if it has a majority in its favour, the building would always be to a section of the community a memorial of an unfortunate controversy—a sign of triumph or defect, as the case may be—rather than a memorial of those who gave their lives in the war. Nothing could be more repugnant to right feeling than to have such a scheme associated with acute differences. On the other hand, the Duke of Atholl would be placed in an awkward position by its abandonment. He as the custodian of a huge sum of money which has been collected on the understanding that the memorial is to be at the Castle. It would be easy enough to return the largo donations,—especially the anonymous gift of £so,oo9—but what is to bo done with the substantial amount raised by street collections and other similar methods? I suppose we shall have a resort to the familiar device of a Commission, but it is quite certain that no such tribunal, however authoritative, will please everybody whatever its decision. UNEMPLOYMENT SCHEMES. There is a serious danger that in their anxiety to find schemes for the relief of unemployment the local authorities will undertake many works which will prove “white elephants,” and saddle the ratepayers with heavy burdens for a generation to, come. Edinburgh, in particular, seems to have gone mad over road-mak-ing ideas, and has plans in hand involving an expenditure of nearly half a million. Glasgow has in view the construction of a “boulevard,” whatever that may be, from Anniesland to Duntooher at an outlay of about a similar amount. 1 suspect that the word is a disguise for a motor road, for which there is much to be said, since it would provide a means of avoiding the congested streets of the Clydeside shipbuilding centres on the way from Glasgow to the lower reaches of tho river. Personally, I have doubts about the wisdom of turning workless men to road-making, for. which so many of them are physically unsuited. .The difficulty is to suggest any alternative that would not bo even more wasteful. OUR AIN FISH-GUTS.

No doubt in the eyes of the political economists the Edinburgh Town Council did a very wicked thing the other day when it decided that a contract for tramway rails should go to Middlesbrough rather than to Belgium, though the cost will be £SOOO more, and to bqy tram-cars from a local rather than a North of England firm. The additional money spent will be more than saved by the reduction of out-of-work payments to men who will be employed by keeping the contracts at home. There is, of course, the danger that preference to iOcal tenders may encourage the formation of ‘‘rings” among the home manufacturers, but that risk seems worth running, especially as the competition between them is exceedingly keen, and the head of a big steel-making concern tells mo that even at the price quoted the British firms will lose about £1 a ton. One way of not improving the lot of the unemployed is to encourage them to take part in the so-called ‘‘hunger-marches” to London, The accounts given by some of the men who have undergone the experience should be a warning to others. SCOTTISH MINISTERS. The Government are no nearer finding a seat for the Lord Advocate, which the Prime Minister undertook to do before Parliament meets at the middle of next month. It has been suggested that if Mr Watson cannot gain access to Westminister his place will be given to Mr F. C. Thomson, the member for South Aberdeen, a most charming fellow, and a great friend of my own. Being well-to-do, he never troubled much about his practice at the bar, and he is under no illusions as to his fitness for the leadership of his profession. But it is interesting to note that he is about to become a K.C., Mr James Kidd, the Scottish Under-Secretary, who was another of the victims of the election, tells mo that his resignation has gone in. this week, to be put into operation when it suits the Government. But he has by no means given up hope of being back in the House of Commons before many months are over. His most likely successor as Under-Secretary is Captain Walter Elliott.

EDINBURGH’S MEDICAL OFFICER. The death of Dr Maxwell Williamson, Medical Officer of Health in Edinburgh, was a great shock to the public, for only his intimate friends know that ho was seriously ill. Though he figured less in the public eye than his famous predecessor and former chief, Sir Henry Littlejohn, he was a most zealous public servant, whoso efficiency was registered by the steady fall in the deathrate to a point never before reached. Converted from percentages to actual figures, the improvement meant that, the number of deaths in the city was diminished by 2000 per annum. They way he handled a recent outbreak of smallpox in one of our poor-houses and prevented it spreading to the outside community was masterly. He was a bachelor, and spent the last eighteen years of his life in a Princes street hotel. He had only one interest outside his work, if indeed it was outside —namely, _ the promotion of religion, and he was a familiar figure on evangelical platforms. Like most other boys his first ambition was to be an engineer, and he completed his apprenticeship in that profession in his native town of Leith. Heredity proved too strong, and he took to his father’s profession. But in dealing with public health matters, he found his knowledge of engineering of considerable value. OUR MUSEUM OF ANTIQUITIES. ' After being closed for many months to undergo a process of re-organisation, the Scottisn Museum cf Antiquities was reopened this week by tbo Earl of Balfour, rtho, after bringing philosophy down to the man in the street in his Gifford lectures at Glasgow, is enjoying a brief rest at Wbitlingluime betore going to Genova to represent Great Britain at the League of Naums Ills Iriends are amazed by Ins recovery of mental and physical vigour. lie is to all intents and purposes younger than, he was twenty years ago. During the Chirstmas holidays ho beat a former Ministerial colleague, twenty-five years his junior, in a set of lawn tennis. The Museum I propose (o ro-visit shortly, after an absence of 1 am ashamed to think how many years. The experts tell mo that few institutions of the kind have a collection so fully illustrative of the past history of the nation. The exhibit which always fascinated me most was a suit belonging to a Scottish peasant of fully 300 years ago. The wearer had evidently been trapped while crossing a Caitlmes-shiro bog, and after centuries his skeleton was discovered with th© clothes perfectly preserved. Sculptured stones, urns, cists, weapons, and all the other raw materials of the antiquarian’s trade arc in abundance, and there is also a collection of ivory chessmen of tbo twelfth century, found in a Stornoway cave —a standing and. so far, insoluble problem. Too many of our Edinburgh citizens never cross the threshold of the Museum except when they are showing the sights to some country cousin. EDINBURGH AND MUSIC. Are there 2000 people in Edinburgh who are seriously interested in serious music? A negative answer is suggested by the fact that the fate of the Reid Orchestra is hanging in the balance. The orchestra, which is an adjunct of the Chair of Music founded about a hundred years ago by General Reid, has been kept going for the last, three years by a guarantee fund, but that is now. cx-