GREEK TEMPLES UNEARTHED.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20291, 27 December 1927, Page 3

GREEK TEMPLES UNEARTHED.

Important Greek monuments of the fifth century before Christ have been discovered in the province of Salerno. The remains of three temples, a roadway, the ruins of domestic bouses and a fortress have been located (writes the correspondent of the Morning Post). The principal temple stands on a slope of the hill of Velia in the Greek-haunted locality of Sapri. From its size the temple is calculated to have been the seat of the Eleatic school of philosophy, identified with Zeno and Parmenides. There are prospects that the dimensions of the temple will make it unique as far as its basic structure is concerned, although part of it has been destroyed, evidently in the Middle Ages, to make way for the castle of Velia. , , It is likely from evidence already unearthed that a considerable section of the original Greek roadway will be uni covered, together with ruins of domestic ! houses and a draw-well. On an adjacent j hill lie the two further discovered temples, | also of the Greek epoch, each having what I are described as beautiful pavements of terracotta brickwork. In one a large sacrificial altar was found, and a little to the north of this group of temples a | Greek castle or fortress has been discovered, with a stairway blocked by a large heap of stones. The excavations are being continued. AFFORESTATION COMPANIES. TO THE EDITOR. Sir, —There is only one point to investigate, at any rate in the case of the one principal company, which the critics evidently have in mind. It does not matter how many millions it has collected or will collect from its customers; nor, in fact, how many milions of profit it makes out of its job, if that is to be the way of it. The contract it makes is simple: “Give us £25, and we will plant, conserve, and maintain one acre of profitable trees for you, and that acre so planted will be yours.” Tim company suggests that the acre will be worth £SOO in 25 years, but bondholders themselves are free to agree or differ with that estimate: personally, for instance, I differ, yet I have bought, the company’s bonds. The £SOO is not part of its contract. The transfer of one acre, properly and scientifically planted with the right kind of trees, properly looked after and kept that way for 25 years, to daeh subscriber, is what the company offers for £25. Anyone can decide whether that is a reasonable gamble. It is no business of the bondholders whether the company has 100 employees or 10,000; whether it is building a dozen bridges nr 50; whether it is going to make a million out of its enterpr'se or wash up ultimately for half a crown. The sole point of interest to each bondholder is: “Do [ got my acre of the right trees, correctly planted, for my £25, and is the company I going to perform its contract with me to : hiring those trees up to saleable timber ! in 25 years, watching, conserving, and renewing, if necessary, all that time, so that : I shall have an acre of real forest to sell : when I am 25 years older? ” Any kind ; of investigation as to the prospect of | that contract being fully performed is i sensible and legitimate—and I may add i that, to me at least, several such investi- ' cations by apparently independent and ! competent judges have, so far, been oni tirely reassuring. Nothing else really i matters. If, as was suggested at the I exchange meeting, the company is spendI ing huge sums in salaries, wages, buildings, bridges, etc.—or, for that matter, even in directors’ “pickings’,” or less legitimate items —that is quite as likely to promote, as to defeat, the only thing the bondholder has to bother about. When ho bought his bond he ’’eckoned ! that an acre of real forest 25 years hence ; was worth £25 down. If he gets it, he i need not trouble his head about how much j h-es it cost the company to give it to him. ; He is cpiile right to see that be is on the 1 wav really to get it —and that is all. The evidence ho far is that he is going to 1 get it.— l am, etc., SATimED.