FROM NORTH OF TWEED.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20644, 16 February 1929, Page 22

FROM NORTH OF TWEED.

A LETTER TO OVERSEAS SCOTS. Written for the Otago Daily Times. By Robert S. Angus. EDINBURGH, January 3. The year 1928 is dead and few arc those who deplore its departure. It was on the whole a disappointing year; the hopes with winch it opened were not even partially fulfilled in the respects of most importance; and it has closed with our staple industries in worse plight than most of us care to contemplate. The best that can he said is that again signs of hope are showing themselves, and one would fain believe that these cannot be again illusory. It is at any rate satisfactory that the public conscience is fully awakened to the seriousness of the immediate problem that has to he met, — the alleviation of the distress which is prevalent in the mining fields. Already the fund of Lord Provost Stevenson is approaching £20,000, which the Government is pledged to double, and other local efforts are being equally well supported. But much more is required, not in spasmodic gifts but in a regular stream of assistance if serious privation in many humble households is to be avoided. There can be no real improvement till trade revives. I am glad to see that Lord Weir, one of the most alert of our industrial captains, has satisfied himself, in the course of a tour of the United States, - that this country has little to fear from industrial rivalry in that country, provided we develop the Home market and ■ give our younger leaders a chance. The outlook for the coal trade—the one that matters most at present —is a litle brighter, and the Clyde has been cheered by another halfmillion order from the Canadian Pacific Railway, which has been a real friend in need to that shipbuilding centre. POVERTY AND THRIFT.

More than once I have referred to the paradox that in a time of depressed trade and widespread poverty the deposits in the savings banks are increasing at an 'unprecedented rate. Glasgow, for instance, added about 8000 new depositors and raised its balance by over a million sterling last year while Edinburgh showed about two-thirds of that amount to the good. The explanation, I think, was that suggested by a speaker at one of the annual meetiu ;s. In prosperous times wage-earners are apt to spend freely, but when they see every trade depressed and their friends being thrown out of work wholesale they realise that their own turn may come any day and that they must make such provision as they can against it. In s;i far as that is true the savings-banks are serving the purpose for which they were intended. On the other hand, the casual stroller through our streets while he sees much evidence of poverty, sees also much that points to no lack of money. The kinema houses and the theatres are crowded; thousands of enthusiasts travel every week-end to follow the fortunes of their favourite football club; motor cars and motor cycles become more numerous every day; the shops which deal in luxuries, from silk stockings to gramophones and wireless sets admit that they are doing well. I am, I hope, no kill-joy, but I should like to see surplus money being spent more productively. The price of going, say, from Glasgow to Aberdeen to a football match, with the incidental expenses, would buy a good pair of boots.

LESS CRIME. It takes the authorities a year to compile the statistics of crime, so that the figures only now available relate to 1927. They provide encouraging reading. There may be fluctuations from year to year, but a comparison with the year 1913 gives undeniable proof that we are becoming better behaved. Convictions for drunkenness are now only two-fifths of what they were in the earlier years, while assaults and breaches of the peace —which generally arise from too much drink—have each fallen to less than half, while theft cases have diminished from 9000 to 7500. Compared with these figures, the increase of motor car offences from 1000 to 12,000 is of no importance. Ihc beneficent change should convince the temperance reformers that the further restrictions for which they clamour are little needed.

EDUCATION IMPROVEMENT.

As usual, the teachers have been spending their New Year holiday, or part of it, in “talking shop ” at their annual conference—on this occasion in St. Andrew’s, where the university authorities gave them a cordial welcome. They conferred the degree of LL.D. on the president of the institute, Mr Peter Comrie, rector of Leith Academy. In his presidential address. Dr Connie, like Principal Irvine, Sir John Gilmour, the Scottish Secretary, and Mr William Adamson, his predecessor, took an optimistic view of the ducational position. They agree that while it has many weak points they tend to become smaller and less serious. I was interested to learn that the principal is not worried by the possible danger of the Scottish student being pampered. He holds that at the best he (or she) has still to combine plain living with high thinking to attain success. St, Andrew’s has always been the favourite resort of the poor student. Sir John Gilmour paid a tribute to tiie work of the education authorities during the 10 years of their existbut remains none the less firmly convinced that the functions will be more advantageously undertaken as his Local Government Bill proposes, as part of the work of the county councils.

THE BRACKEN PEST. ' _ To the townsman bracken is merely a picturesque ingredient in the landscape, spreading its summer green and' its autumn bronze with delightful effect. But to the cultivator it is merely a nuisance, rapid in growth, difficult to eradicate, and ruinous to the life of other and more useful plants. It cannot be burned out, for after a heath fire the bright green fronds of the bracken are the first to show themselves on the blackened soil. Many thousands of acres have been rendered economically barren. Happily there is a prospect of the pest being brought under control. Two of our young scientists, Mrs N. L. Alcock, plant pathologist to the Board of Agriculture, and Professor K. W. Braid, of the botany department of the West of Scotland Agricultural College, have found bracken suffering from a fungoid disease which lowers its vitality but is innocuous to trees. Experiments which promise well arc now being made to discover if this disease cau be spread by inoculation or infection. If so, its virulent character will, it is hoped, reduce the problem to reasonable dimensions. That bracken can ever be exterminated by this process is not pretended, but at least the present economic waste can be substantially lessened.

“JOHNNIE WESTON.” Mr Weston would have been the last to resent being referred to by the familiar name by which he was known to all his friends. Until he retired some ten years ago he had been for more than 30 years prosecutor in Edinburgh Police Court, a post which it might be supposed. would reduce even the kindliest of men to a cynical view of his fellowmen. It had no such effect on Weston. To the last, though he could be severe on scoundrels, he remained on the outlook for some extenuating circumstance in the ugliest cases, and many an offender whom an amateur magistrate would have sent to hard labour, received another chance as the result of a kindly hint from the prosecuting officer. Mr Weston’s long experience gave him an instinct for distinguishing between the hopeless case and the one which held at least some promise of reform, and after hours he would often exert himself

to help some wretch who was on the brink of a criminal career. Mr Weston was a keen student of local history and in social gatherings of all sorts a welcome figure. SIR GEORGE M'CRAE. I had not seen or heard from Sir George M'Crnc for some months, and consequently the report of his death came as a complete surprise. At more than one point his career just missed success.- Appointed when little over 30 as city treasurer he brought about many valuable reforms in municipal finance, and it was only by a single vote that he failed to become Lord Provost at the age of 40. That disappointment led him to transfer his activities to Parliament where he created a good impression by his readiness in handling figures. Too iduch attention to public affairs and too little to his own business made it necessary for him to accept a position in the civil service—as vice-president of the Board of Health—and after he had qualified for pension there he returned to Westminster only to find that lie had been forgotten during his 15 years’ absence and that he was out of touch with the new alignment of parties. In the meantime he had raised within ten days and commanded in the field a battalion of the Royal Scots. As to his work in that capacity there is still some controversy which is never likely to be cleared up. But Sir George’s enthusiasm in whatever he took up was manifest and his public work was all the more estimable in view of the sacrifice of personal interest it involved. A RADIOLOGY PIONEER. . Dr Dawson Turner, who retired from practice some years ago owing to illhealth, is entitled to a high place among the pioneers and martyrs of radiology. He was one of the first to recognise the importance of Rontgen rays and his •apparatus, a primitive affair which he acquired in 1895, was the first and for some time the only. specimen in Edinburgh. ‘lt became the nucleus, of the splendid installation of the Royal Infirmary. Three years later, when radium was discovered, he was again first in the field. Like his fellow-workers he did not realise the dangers of the new discoveries and he lost three fingers and an eye as the result of dermatitis. Dr Dawson Turner, who was an accomplished linguist and a man of wide general culture, owned one of the first motor cars in Scotland and one of the first mechanical piano-players, and to the last, in spite of his acute suffering, he was enthusiastic over every new device. Though he was a native of Liverpool and a graduate of Oxford he spent the whole of his working life in Scotland, and is entitled- to a high place among the leaders of medicine in Edinburgh. WINTRY WEATHER. New Year celebrations and holidays deliberately prolonged owing to dull trade in the staple industries, have been accompanied by weather which is seasonable but unpleasant. All over the north and west traffic is much impeded by snow;, and in the towns we are getting it in the form of slush. But after last year’s record of line weather we can hardly complain.