PASSING NOTES.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20318, 28 January 1928, Page 6

PASSING NOTES.

Mr Coates has “ released ” to all newspapers an official diagnosis and prognosis of the tropical fever epidemic in Samoa, with temperature chart and other pathological details. “ Released,” implying a previous restraint, may bo the newspaper word, expressing the newspaper feeling that Mr Coates, as physi-, cian in charge, ought to have spoken earlier. The information he gives is belated. To which Mr Coates might reply with heat that these medical metaphors are not his; further, that party politicians and able editors would find the Samoan trouble amply explained in that lexicon of British Imperialism, “ Eudyard Kipling’s Verso, Inclusive Edition, 1885-1926,” sold in New Zealand at 32s 6d a copy, and cheap at the price. There is it written that we have sent forth (to Samoa) "the best we breed” To wait in heavy harness On fluttered folk and wild — The new-caught, sullen peonies ; Half-devil and half-child. And the seer exhorts us: Take up the White Man’s burden— The savage wars of peace— Fill ful the mouth of Famine, And bid the sickness cease: And when your goal is nearest The end for others sought. Watch Sloth and heathen Folly Bring all your hopes to naught. Take up the White Man's burden— And reap his old reward : The blame of those ye better, The hate of those ye guard— The cry of hosts ye humour (Ah, slowly!) toward the light—- “ Why brought ye us from bondage, Our loved Egyptian night! ” . . . If Mr Coates had “ released ” this with other verses relevant he might have spared himself and us some columns of solid print. After Mr Coates, Mr Holland. Late or early, in prose or verse, let Mr Coates but open his mouth officially, and at once Mr Holland is “on the pounce.” Naturally, for as Leader of the Opposition, Mr Holland, at the head of his baker’s dozen, 13 by count, is an authority. In his view “ the proud and dignified Samoan people ” —not “ halfdevil and half-child ” though natives of a South Sea island—are under the protection of Magna Carta “ in fits fundamental principles.” And in its original Latin; —if King John and his baronage of the twelfth century could palaver in the tongue of Cicero—and apparently they did —why not a South Sea islander ? It is stipulated by Magna Carta in its original Latin that “no freeman shall be outlawed or exiled but by judgement of his peers or by the law of the land.” In face of that we have these Samoan deportations without any pretence of trial. “ A preventive measure to facilitate good government ” says Mr Coates. On which we have M, Holland’s comment: “Mr Coates’s next move may possibly be to deport his political opponents in the Dominion to facilitate good government.” Well, yes, if his political opponents were teaching New Zealanders to be Samoans. For in Samoa “ the King’s writ is not running.” The proud and dignified Samoans arc—refusing to obey the orders and summonses of the court, even though serious indictable and criminal offences are involved. They are refusing to pay their taxes. They are failing to search for beetles, or to account for those collected. They are neglecting their_ plantations. They are keeping their children from the Government schools, and, perhaps most serious of all, they are rejecting medical help and neglecting sanitary precautions. If this were their teaching, the Opposition might without offence be taken by the scruff of the neck and passed across the sky-line. Mr Holland and his baker’s dozen deported! Not a few of us would say.in a phrase of the Eastern Counties—“ And a good shuttance! ” America, we do well to remind ourselves, is rich and big. And bumptious in proportion, the Americans themselves remind us. Bumptious,—that is, politically considered, and in relation to mankind at large. In a recent Punch cartoon President Calvin Coolidge (delightful name!) is delivering a lecture, with blackboard and pointer, and with his theme chalked up; — We lead the world in—1. Wealth. 2. Generosity. 3. Humility. 4. Love of Peace. From the side of mankind at large we give a qualified assent. “ Wealth ” yes; that is conceded. “ Generosity ” yes again; in collecting war debts the generosity if Shylock. “ Humility ” doubtless!—the humility of Uriah Hecp. And the Devil doth grin, for his darling sin Is pride that apes humility. “ Love of Peace ” —ah —um! But at this point the President takes up: “ And what is ouv logical conclusion from this, my friends ? ” he asks with an ingratiating smile. “ Obviously that we must build more warships.” And the American Bird o’ Freedom, perched triumphant on top of the terrestrial globe, corroborates with flapping wings and “ Cock-a-doodle-doo! ” Thus the Punch cartoon, apt and good. Concurrently, apropos of the President’s message to Congress, there went the round of the House of Commons, passed from hand to hand, a pencilled jeu d’esprit, as the newspapers call it:— The Americans Invented the Treaty of Versailles, and—did not sign it. Invented the League of Nations, and —did not join it. Invented the Naval Disarmament Conference, and—built more ships. Invented the cocktail, and—voted themselves “ dry.” In the last item we come upon the American Pussyfoot—sinister figure!— with the congeries of contradictions and confusions that name connotes. From America on the political side, and on the Pussyfoot side, lot us get such amusement as wc can. We are not likely to get anything else. Church of England people cannot be happy just now in the prospects of their Prayer Book, nor indeed in their relations with each other. On the question of amending the book Anglo-Catnolics and the “ Protestant underworld ” are at each other’s throats; while, hostile to both parties and to all parties, the hosts ol Midian prowl and prowl around. Reverberations of the drum ecclesiastic that reach these distant shores are more easily echoed across the Atlantic. America is seen at best in its periodic literature. Its newspapers, ugly and repellent, are tor the most part not literature at all ; but its magazines—Harper’s, the Atlantic Monthly, the North American Review, ana others —compare to their advantage with anything in that kind the British can show. There could be no higher praise. In the Atlantic Monthly, where you would least expect to find it, is an intelligent account of the Prayer Book controversy. I borrow a sentence or two: Mr George Saintsbury complains that “ that magnificent motto of all true love and marriage, ‘ With ray body 1 thee worship.’ has been watered down inf o ‘ With my body 1 thee l honour.’ ” To which Bishop Temple, | of Manchester, replies (hat Mr Saintsbnry can never have attended a wed j ding in a shim parish, or ho would have realised how much of the magni firent language of the old Prayer 8001-: is unmeaning and even misleading in people of our day who have, not re relied an advanced literary education.

This Mr George Saintsbury, of the Edinburgh University, ex-Professor of Literature and first among English literary critics, is right seven times over. What is amiss in ‘‘ With my body I thee worship ” ? The magistrate on the bench is “ your Worship,' 1 and every city mayor. Bishop Temple is not unaware that the

one essential to a valid marriage is , intention. VVords may be this or that, ceremony may be thus or thus ;—it is no matter. The slum couple are there to be married ; the parson is there to verify their intention and proclaim it, declaring them married. When the man is required to say, “ With all my worldly gooas 1 thee endow ” what he really says may be “ With all my mumble-mumble I thee and thou.” The words may be abracadabra; , it matters nothing; intention is everything. la it true that the Prayer Book revisers have deleted from the marriage service the wife’s promise to “obey”? Sheer silliness! In the wisdom of Dogberry, “ An two men ride of a horse, one must ride behind.” And Dogberry might have continued, “ An one of the two men be a woman, the principle is the same.” It is the central secret of marital relations that in and by obeying the woman commands. A delightful paradox, and an indubitable truth. Some examples of Chinese shop-signs for behoof of a British public amused us last week, one of the best, over a milliner’s shop in Shanghai, being, “ Ladies can have fits upstairs.” India, where for genei 'tions past wc have taught English and English literature to the young baboo, is rich in the results of our Quixotism. Thus a Calcutta signboard : “ Guilty shop is inside,” —the business inside being the gilding of picture frames. A silk-store advertisement will bear detailed study: “ In excessive wants of these cloth I have taken such study and precautions as to start a fine shop in that part of the city which lies in entire scarcity of such cloth.” He continues with the same lucidity:— I hope therefore, to help, please, and satisfy those customers who are constantly and infinitely ill-treated by contraband of almost all shopkeepers. I affirm, on the other hand, to place my shop in firm conviction of my customers as an example ,of truthfulness and honesty. This shop will go an imitation of Benares itself, which is a _ symbol of purity, holiness, and spiritualism. “ Failed 8.A.” ought to be the signature to this. The college-bred baboo often advertises himself under that proud designation. But we may come nearer home. A Paris restaurant, appealing to Englishspeaking tourists, announces; “ Salines Baths at every o’clock. Our wines will leave you nothing to hope for." Ckvis.