PASSING NOTES.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19441, 28 March 1925, Page 6

PASSING NOTES.

Mr 11. E. Holland was introduced to a Dunedin meeting the other night as “New Zealand’s Prime Minister in the near future.” It is pleasant to know what good things await us. Good things! —Mr Holland’s hands are full of good things. As he himself proceeded to show. In Samuel Warren’s once famous novel “Ten Thousand a Year” there is a benefactor of the species whose idea is a “Bill for Giving Everybody Everything. ’ His name was not Holland, but our Mr Holland stands in his shoes and talks a philanthropy not less spacious. Then there is the historic Jack Cade, who must often be in Mr Holland’s mind: There shall be in England seven halfpenny loaves sold for a penny; the three-hooped pot shall have ten hoops: and I will make it felony to drink small beer; all the realm shall be in common; there shall bo no money; all shall eat and drink on my score; and I will apparel them all in one livery, that they may agree like brothers and worship mo their lord. But -whenever Jack Cade as New Zealand’s Prime Minister brings in his “Bill for Giving Everything to Everybody,’’ as set forth in Mr Holland's reported speech the other night, it will turn out to be a Bill for Taking Everything from Everybody ; —confiscation, no less. On this point T may be permitted to quote an undoubted authority—“Givis,” to wit, in Passing Notes; date, about six months back, —August 24, 1924, to be precis©: Air Holland is no ignoramus. He is mot in the least befogged about the nature of the “Marxian Socialism" of which he has just made bare-faced and unblushing avowal. Marxian Socialism means that the sheep farmer would lose his sheep, the dairy farmer his dairy cows, the merchant his merchandise, the shopkeeper bis shopkeeping. Not only in land and houses would private ownership cease, but in mines, mills, factories, shipping. The Otago Daily Times and the Otago Witness, Siamese twins, would become a pair of Government Gazettes edited by the Soviet. What would happen to the churches may ue inferred from what has happened where the Marxian gospel has had free course and statues of Karl Marx have been set up. Under strict censorship the First Church, Knox Church, and the Cathedral would be permitted a Marxian service, preceded by the singing of “The Red Flag.” Bor other ecclesiastical buildings a use would be found as barracks and places of detention, for of course the prisons would be full. Personally, the Marxian pirate who is to do these things may be amiable and kindly, tjio mildest mannered man That ever scuttled ship or cut a throat; but do them he will. And he will begin by confiscating property. Apparently Mr Holland dislikes the term and would avoid it. But confiscation by any other name would cut as deep. Anniversary day for Otago and Southland fell this -week, and wo commemorated as in duty bound the fathers and founders. It was a braw and prideful time. The Pleasures of Memory, sung by poets, are with many of us not seldom a pleasurable melancholy. We twa hae run about the braes, And pou’d the gowans fine ; But we’ve wandered mony a weary ntt Sin - auld lang syne. Wo twa hae paidl’d in the burn Frae morning eun till dine; But seas between us braid hae roar’d Sin’ auld lang syne. Truer sentiment was never penned. This is Scottish, and from the English side comes an answering strain : Tears, idle team, I know not what they mean, Tears from the depth of some divine despair Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes, In looking on the happy Autumn-fields, And thinking of the days that are no more. Over against that, when we think of the New Zealand pioneers, is the pride of ancestry end the solid satisfaction of achievement. To read Dr Merrington’s apt discourse in First Church, Sir George Fenwick's vivid reminiscences, and Professor Park’s fascinating story is to become aware of an awkward doubt whether the former days were not better than these. 1 verily believe that they were happier days. The Scottish Argonauts of the John Wickliffe and Philip Laing, the English University men like Parson Andrew, had indeed left civilisation for the wilderness; but they were happier with hard work, plain living, the open sky, and the brave sou’-west weather than we arc with our creature comforts—furnished houses, paved streets, telephones, electric light, motor cars, picture theatres, concert halls and steepled kirks —not to mention labour strikes and “class consciousness.” It has been told us on authority, and wo had better believe it, that a man’s life consisteth not in the abundance of the things that he possesseth.

To touch on a moot point of grammar is to set agog every school teacher within the bounds. That is my experience in this column. A chance remark last week in justification of the anomaly “Who’s there?,” “It’s me,” —parallel with the French anomaly “C’est moi” and “Moi qui vous parle” has brought me halfa column of learned discourse, mostly corroborative. I make room for two specimens;

Dear “Civis,”—As a regular reader of your entertaining column, may T submit a small quotation to you concerning the grammar of “ It is I,” etc. The quotation is from The Times Educational Supplement, January 31 last, and is found in an article “ What is Good English? ” It is only in recent times that anyone has arisen with the courage to defend “It was him.” Actually the defence is simple: it consists, iii recognising the fact that a nominative which is not the subject of a verb may differ in form from one that is. When without a verb it is called a disjunctive nominative, and “ him ” is such a nominative. So your worthy upholding of “It is him ” has also the support of a grammatical ruling.

Thanks. The other is from a high authority on these questions, and his words have weightDear “ Civis,” —A correspondent of

yours can’t see the grammatical sin in “Whom do men say that I am? ” My pedagogical instinct is stimulated. Written thus, “ Men say that I am—who? ” the case becomes clear. Grammar books usually content themselves with “The verb ‘ to be ’ takes the same case after it as before.” The reason seems to be that the Caucasian mind regards the verb “be’’ as merely asserting an identity; it Is incapable of expressing a mental or physical act that passes over to an object. I could easily disgorge upon you at least two columns, for a question of grammar to your true teacher is like the fragrance of usquebaugh to the tribes (lost, of course!)—“ non solum in Caledonia, sed etian in Hibernia,” —it creates insomnia till the matter be disposed of. But as you lately chid me for lack of brevity, I forbear. But you said, you know, that the half was more than the whole (Horiod originated that mot. I believe, and Plato gave it currency). But come now, is it even so? Ask a

goffer-—ls the half more than the hole? I don’t know that it is. But I know that Dr Johnson said, or is said to have said, that a man who would make a pun would pick a pocket.

Even in Scotland the doctrine that brevity is the soul of wit is winning its way. Five-mile prayers and three-mile graces—beginning with the Fall of Man —are no longer in fashion. Speaking at a Bums Club dinner in Edinburgh the Rev. Dr Black sc id that on going to preach in a countrv kirk he was asked by the beadle, “lla'e vo your sermon written ?” When he replied that be had, the beadle exclaimed, “I’m rale glee], because when than folk come wi’ a paper, ye ken tliey'll stop when that stops ; but when they ha‘e nae paper nvn*. the Almichty Hirasel’ disna ken when they’re likelv tae feenish.” Not so long ago the written sermon was anathema to the Scotsman,

From Tcmuka: Dear Civis.—Don’t you think it ia time for some great Napoleon statesman to rise .and crush out these combines, trusts, .and labour unions, and let us bo a free people once more? Uur nation is in bondage to curses at present; they know neithejj justice nor patriotism. A Napoleon, is it, that we want? Or a Cromwell, shall we say ? My own private conviction is that, if Bolshevists on the waterfront and elsewhere continue to provide what Mr Justice Quick, of Sydney, calls “outrages worse than bushranging” we shall have to develop a British Mussolini. Yes, that would meet the case— Mussolini and the castor oil treatment. Writing from Assisi, a correspondent of the Morning Post says; This is the third winter I have spent in Italy. I have visited, amongst other places, Rome, Naples, Sorrento, Amalfi, Florence, Pisa, Milan, Padua, Verona, Modena, Bologna, Parma, Venice, and Ferrara. Nowhere have I seen the slightest disorder or heard one murmur of discontent against the present Italian Government. The people are working as they never worked before and with a good will . . . there is more liberty in Italy to-day than in England. Bracket with this a sentence or two from a leading article in the same paper glooming over affairs in England: No sooner has one strike failed than another begins. Such is the plan of campaign devised by the vast and secret conspiracy which, we assert with full knowledge of the facts, is at work throughout the country. During and since the war, the constant succession of strikes, with a few exceptions, has been arranged by the revolutionaries, who are found in nearly every 'Trade Union and on the Left of the Socialist Party. Plainly a case for the Mussolini prescription. So also on this side of the world. At the Bolshevist head-quarters in Wellington there is a clear call for Mussolini’s castor oil in adequate doses. And I should like to see it administered. The ‘‘prayer chain” nuisance is rife again. Thus, through the post this day: AN ENDLESS- CHAIN OP PRAYER. ‘‘God bless our soldiers and sailors, and hold them in the hollow of His hand.” The above was sent to me. It has been all over the world. Send it to seven married persons. On the seventh day you will meet with great joy. It is said that all who write this shall meet with groat luck, and all who pass it by with misfortune. Copy this, and see what happens. Start the day you receive it, and write for saven days. Please do not break the chain ns it was started on the battlefield of Flanders. Copy this and sign your name. The pious imbeciles who perpetuate this absurdity are the reproach of the churches that breed them. What are our city pulpiteers about? Otvis.