PASSING NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 1892, 15 May 1890, Page 23

PASSING NOTES.

THE "Imperial Socialist," as some of the European and American papers now dub the German Emperor, is naturally coming in for a good deal of acrid criticism anent his labour reforms, especially since he got rid of the brake upon his wheel by the dismissal of Bismarck. Here is a specimen :—": — " What will he do next? Nobody can guess. His movements are at once as momentous and as inscrutable as those of the unbound cannon on the deck of the corvette in Victor Hugo's ' Ninety-three.' There is no doubt that just now he sincerely believes himself to be resolved on peace. For the past few weeks he has been moving about wrapped in a mystical dream of Christian Socialism, his emotional bosom stirred with deep love for all mankind." Universal disarmament, eternal peace, Alsace-Lorraine neutralised and made independent, swords beaten into ploughshares and spears into pruning hooks, Frank and Teuton to embrace, labour and capital to kiss each other — this is the programme of the immediate future as announced from Berlin. By way of practical comment upon it, Russia has promptly moved down eight new regiments towards the Galician frontier, and France has ordered up troops from the south to strengthen her northern quadrilateral. " It is not forgotten," says tlie writer I have quoted, "that this young man, who has the finest army in the world for a plaything, has in his veins not only the blood of the. fighting Hohenzollerns, but the blood of the crazy English George and the crazier Eus&ian Paul." Consequently now that Bismarck is gone, and the Emperor has taken to preaching Christianity, Socialism, and universal brotherhood, the puzzled nations don't know what to expect, and so prepare for the worst. It is a curious situation. Evidently the neighbours of Germany preferred the man of "blood and iron." With the stern, uncompromising, old-world paganism of Bismarck they knew exactly where they were. The mercurial and Quixotic philanthropy of the Emperor suggests only distress of nations with perplexity, and they resolve anew to keep their weather eye open and their powder dry.

There was a certain English king once who was in a difficulty, as I am at this present moment. A bill was presented to him for signature, which, when that formality was concluded, would have had the effect of cutting off the head of a favourite, but most unpopular, minister. He wanted to save his minister's head and at the same time run no risks with his own throne. In sore straits he consulted his bishops, who advised him that he had two consciences — a public conscience and a private one — and that " his public conscience as a king might not only dispense with, but oblige him to do, that which was against his conscience as a man." With the approval of his public conscience, therefore, and the denunciations of his private one he signed the fatal bill. I have always irreverently laughed at the advice of these bishops, but find to my astonishment that I also have two consciences. Thus with my public conscience I emphatically condemn the conduct of Mr Logan, J.P., for his outrageous sentence on the lad Mordon, who was found peacefully sleeping in a stable somewhere or other. The sentence was perfectly indefensible without a doubt. By all means let it be annulled. But in the light of my private conscience I am forced to admit that four months of hard labour, with spare food and a clean bed to lie on are circumstances calculated to do the young man good. As a general rule there is something wrong with young men, able to earn themselves a bed, who prefer to lie in stables. May it not be a mistake to suppose that such a young man must necessarily leave gaol a debased and contaminated criminal 1 I can conceive him returning to the world healthily braced alike in mind and body. The advantages of exercise are inestimable. A friend of mme — needless to say a literary man — was a martyr to bilious headaches, and used to enumerate his various symptoms whenever, in an unguarded moment, one happened to ask him the conventional " how d'ye do." On one occasion he was so despondent that I urged him to try the cold water cure as a la3t resource. " It's of no use," he said sadly, " I know what would do me good, but 1 can't get it." It was with notions in my head of a winter in the Riviera, or a season under the care of a fashionable London doctor, that I asked the natural question : " What is that ? "

" What I require above all things," he said, " is three months on the roads." And it was true, though he never got it.

In thus confidently giving my opinion as to what is good for a youth, it can hardly be said that I am lacking in experience. In the matter of young Civises I am well qualified to meet the enemy at the gate. The intelligent reader will doubtless remember the fact of my sending a youth to the Exhibition to be educated in the industrial arts, but whose studies I afterwards found to have been confined to the skin of a racehorse — I f oi get the animal's name— and the switchback railway. A week or two later I accidently met the same youth returning from school in the afternoon. Here I may remark that almost from his infancy he fell into a habit of returning from school at a much faster pace than he went there, which may account for his stumbling upon me on this occasion unawares. I noticed that he suddenly passed his hand athwart his mouth and then plunged it into his coat pocket. I also noticed that from that pocket there issued a thin wreath of smoke, which curled itself away into the eternal blue ; but I said nothing. On the Sunday morning following I produced after breakfast a box of strong

Indian cigars, with which I had been pre sented, and selecting one myself I passed the box to the heir of the house of Civis, sayin carelessly, " Have a cigar, Jack."

" Thank you, I think I will," said the boy, a flush of manly pleasure overspreading his cheek.

I smoked in silence, but the lad was enthusiastic. An after breakfast cigar was delicious. He liked Indian cigars ; the flavour was excellent. As the cigar dwindled in length his enthusiasm seemed to die away somewhat. When it was two-thirds gone he rose hastily, remarking that he " would finish his smoke in the open air." He did not appear at dinner — a most unusual occurrence. " Poor Jack is indisposed," remarked Mrs Civis, "that dreadful 'grip' again. I call it a disgrace to medical science that a disease like that should come upon us like a thief in the night ." " The thief has come in the day time," I remarked mildly— a tactical error however.

" I said, a thief in the night, Mr Civis, following the Scriptures, and should like to know if I could follow a better guide ? " "Don't you think," I said, by way of creating a diversion, " it's a little sudden for the grip ? "

" Sudden for tlie grip" (I knew by the emphasis that I had thrown myself away.) " Sudden for the grip, Mr Civis 1 Didn't you get it yourself from ' opening an English paper and write a long rigmarole to the newspapers " " He doesn't sneeze," I ventured to remark. " No, the grip is confined to the stomach at present, poor boy."

On the following Sunday I passed the cigars in the same off-hand fashion. " No, thank you," said the lad ; " I — I — I have given up smoking."

."A sudden change, isn't it," I said; "when did you make up your mind to stop ? " " At 10 o'clock last Sunday morning," he replied with pathetic accuracy. " Ah ! interfered with your Sunday school exercises, no doubt."

" No," he said ; " I was lying down at the time I made up my mind." Let no one say I do not understand how to deal with young men.

When a man is much given to the use of stock phrases there is nothing, I have observed, that staggers him more than a sudden request for a definition. A friend of mine is a little scandalised at my indifference to the " legitimate drama." I ask what is meant by the legitimate drama, and am met with the convenient and patronising "Oh 1 come now, you know that right enough." I persist in my demand and get no more than this. — " The legitimate drama is — of course — why Shakespeare, don't you know — and— that sort of thing." It does not follow that " that sort of thing " has no existence because someone, taken unawares, has a difficulty in defining it. When I sat down to write this note I intended to supply the definition myself, but on further consideration I think I shall leave it alone, Suffice it that the legitimate, drama has an irresistible tender. cy to make me yawn where it was never intended to do so, and elicits some genuine laughter (for which I forgive it) when the blood ought to be curdling at my heart. When, for instance, Macduff says furiously to Macbeth, "Tu-rr-n, hell-hound, tu-rr-n," I laugh in spite of myself. So I observe do my neighbours. Unhappily I once knew a man named Sandy Macduff, whose whole nature was opposed to tragedy in every way, but my imagination will not be controlled by the dramatic representation, and persists in calling up Sandy's stolid visage at the most inopportune time. Again when Marcellus, gravely shaking his head, says " Something is rotten in the state of Denmark," one laughs as naturally as at the Titwillow song in the "Mikado." At various times we have all found so many things rotten in the state of Denmark. The legitimate drama ought to control the imagination and transport it to the scene represented. Unhappily the imagination is easily disturbed by a trifling incongruity. My friend " Partridge " for instance, with whom I sympathise, is disenchanted because the shoes of Eichard 111 and the boots of his wife and sister might have been turned out by Harris as of their latest make. Mr Miln thinks it does not matter much. .1 am afraid it does. Gould we profit by the finest and most eloquent sermon ever delivered if the clergymen appeared in the pulpit with the cocked hat and feathers of, say, General Wolseley ? Or would General Wolseley strike terror into the enemy if he charged them with gown and bands? I hardly think so.

Note the unanimity with which the three city members pounced upon this Mordon incident; observe the emulous zeal of their efforts to rectify the wrong, — with one eye on Mordon and justice, and with the other on the general election ] As might be expected from his characteristic vigilance, energy, humanity, public spirit, tec, &c, Mr Fish was first in the field. It was Mr Fish that hunted up Mr Downie Stewart, that discovered and revealed the fact that Mr Allen was " not at home" when wanted, and that called attention to Dr Fitchett's "unfortunate absence "in Europe. Codlin's your friend, observe — not Short ! Alone I did it, says Codlin — Short was asleep, or otherwise engaged, or on a pleasure jaunt, meditating on the Esquiline and apostrophising the Tiber. Nevertheless, Short, in the persons of Messrs Stewart and Allen, though making a bad start, did manage to get a share in the glorious deed. Jointly and severally the members for Dunedin East and West assailed the Minister of Justice in telegrams as fierce and frequent as those from the member for Duuedin South ; hence, when the victim of a tyrannous magistracy shall have emerged from his prison cell to be banqueted and testimouialised, these two patriots will share in the triumph — and in the credit— as they have shared in the toil. But as for Short as represented by the unfortunate DrFitchett, his case is hopeless. He is out of it altogether. Plis duty was to be here in Dunedin Central on the look-out for the cause that needs assistance, and the wrong that needs resistance, and the good that he could do — with a. view to the general election, like his colleague Codlin. Instead of that, where is he 1 JS T on est invent inn ! When last heard of he was spouting Horace

by moonlight in the seven-hilled city. Most certainly Codlin is our friend* not Short.

The ghastly item of information given below comes to me from a trustworthy source, and I have no reason to doubt that it is correct :

At one of our charitable institutions there often occurs a death, but (during the University session) seldom a funeral. What becomes of the bodies? Ask the authorities of the medical school. lam of course aware that the exigencies of science and education are not to be set aaide in deference to mere sentiment. And yet, look at it how you will, there is much to regret in the fact that the last rites of religion should be withheld from any, even the poorest. By the " last rites of religion " is meant, I suppose, Christian burial. That this should be in some oases impossible is no doubt a thing to regret. But the interests of society are paramount ; facts of the kind referred to must occur all the world over, wherever the healing art is efficiently taught. There would be some incongruity — would there not? — in using the burial service in such cases. "We therefore commit his body to the "—what?— " to the dissecting table?" And yet it would not be impossible, one would think, to devise some kind of religious rite to suit the circumstances. The subject is not exactly appropriate to this column ; I know nothing about it and I don't care to discuss it. The less said on such a matter the better. I assume that all concerned in it show a reasonable degree of decency and humanity, and that probably some suitable " ritual of the dead " is actually in use.

Writing to me on St. George's Day (April 23) a correspondent asks why the Welsh patron saint, St. David, should not be deemed as worthy of a bank holiday as St. George, S■. Andrew, and St. Patrick. " Today," he says, bank clerks are paying due respect to the memory of St. George ; would they not be just as well pleased to get a day off in honour of St.David ? " — aye, or for the matter of that, in honour of Mr H. S. Fish 1 Find me a bank clerk who is not prepared to honour by " a day off" all the saints in the calendar I But the catholicity of a bank clerk's principles in the matter of saints and holidays is not the point. What connection has St. George, or St. Patrick, or St. Andrew, or St. David with banking ? — that is the point. St. George, according to the historian Gibbon, was a Oappadocian army contractor, who made money by supplying bad bacon to the troops of Julian the Apostate. Perhaps it is in admiring recognition of his sharpness in this transaction that our chief financial institutions now religiously observe St. George's Day. How this fraudulent purveyor of damaged pork came to be the patron saint of England has never been satisfactorily explained, nor why his name is supposed to lend lustre to the most noble Order of the Garter, nor why he should be associated with St. Michael the Archangel, as the presiding genius of that most distinguished order of colonial chivalry represented amongst us by Sir Robert Stout. These things are a bottomless mystery. Sir Robert himself, who believes in nothing that he can't explain, should some day explain this to us.

But return we for a moment to the more respectable saints. There is St. Patrick. St. Patrick turned snakes out of Ireland, but he has never been able to turn out the Sassenach — a boon whiGh, from the Irish point of view, would have been very much more to the purpose. Then, there is St. Andrew. I believe nothing is known against the character of St. Andrew. There is no reason to think that he was even a Scotchman. Yet surely these are very insufficient grounds for giving him a bank holiday. Finally there is St. David, who, as my correspondent informs me, was " musical, pious, and good." If this was all they made him a saint for, canonisation must have been cheap in those early times. St. David is said to have been the cousin of King Arthur, a relationship which seems to relegate him to the land of myths. The only other fact known to me about him is that the Welsh wear a leek in their hats on his anniversary, e.g. — in King Henry V : Pistol: Kuowa't thouFluellen? King: Yes. Pistol : Tell him I'll knock his leek about his pale, upon St. Davy'» Day. And afterwards :

Fluellen : I do believe your Majesty takes no scorn To wear the leek upon St. Davy's Day. King : I wear it for a memorable honour : For I am Welsh, you know, good countryman. The sight would be a pleasant one — the sight, whatever the smell— if all colonial Welshmen would Jome out on St. Davy's Day with the national emblem in their hats. I take a pleasure in noting the faithfulness of the Irish to the " wearing of the green " on St. Patrick's Day. Everywhere you meet them, each one with the three-leaved shamrock or ribbon of the national colour in breastknot or buttonhole. When the Welsh show a similar fidelity to the leek it will be early enough to consider whether the merit of St. David entitles him once a year to arrest the course of business and shut up the banks. Civis.

The sale of the exhibition buildings, which commenced on Wednesday, under the conduct of Messrs J. A. Park and Co., E. C. Reynolds and Co., and James Samson and Co., was attended by a large number of buyers from both town and country. The sale started at 11 a.m., and at the luncheon adjournment at 1 o'clock nearly half the bays had been sold. Tho Government were purchasers to a considerable extent, and a number of country residents, the majority from Oamaru and Invercargill, were al«o largo buyers. 'Ihe prices obtained throughout were apparently satisfactory to the comniibsioners.

About 80 applications for revaluation of holdings were considered at Wednesday's meeting of the L'ind Board. They will be further considered on the 26th of June.

The miners at Shag Point have taken legal advice as to whether they can be compelled to vacate the company's houses, and acting on the arlvior tendered to them they have reHolvrd to r'-m:'.i -ii, session of them nnd tight the mail' 1 '- ■ ■,• ' delegate from tho West Coast AaiJ£atiL.t,L.'. Union was to have, been

on the scene on Wednesday to investigate both sides of the dispute. On his decision will depend the issue of the unfortunate trouble.

It is reported that impostors, who are giving themselves out as miners on strike from Shag Point, are soliciting alms in the Fairfield district.

We understand that in the estates of the Misses Calleuder, all palls now due, and the calls to become due in June, September, and December next, being the whole amouut claimed by the Equitable Company, have been paid, and the company have agreed to pass a transfer of the shares to an approved transferee. The respective bankruptcies will, under the circumstance, now be annulled.

It has been decided to form a hairdressers' employes' union in Dunedin. A meeting will be held early next week for the election of office-bearers and the adoption of a set of rules.

The Western Star states that there can be no doubt that the opossum is flourishing to a marvellous extent in the Longwood Bush. Since the animal was protected the Southland Acclimatisation Society have had about 100 secured at Riverton, and these have been distributed in various places, the greater number being sent to the West Coast, where there is small chance of interference with them for years to come. The lads commissioned by the society to capture the opossums get on an average three a day.

An extraordinary scene was (says the Tuapeka Times) witnessed at an up-country township a few days since, when a book agent; called to deliver, at the house of a respectable settler, a book which he stated was ordered some time since. The farmer's wife was in, and denied emphatically ever having signed the order. The " book fiend " persisted in his protestations to the contrary, and so enraged the good housewife that she resorted to summary methods for bringing the debate to a conclusion. Knuckles were employed with effect, and the aid of crockery was also invoked, with the result that the agent's face looked very ugly when he appeared outside a short time afterwards.

The Rangitikei Advocate draws attention to a most rascally case of levanting which has occurred in that district : — " A man took a contract at a hemp mill to produce the fibre at a certain price per ton, and engaged the hands and made himself personally liable to storekeepers for supplies, A few days ago he went to Wellington and drew, it is said, about £200, and instead of coming back to pay his hands cleared out for Australia. Two tradesmen have got accounts against him to an amount of £30 each, and all the hands have been left without a farthing. Unfortunately he had left the country before any steps could be taken to secure him. Some of the men, we hear, had been working gratis for the Rangitikei Fibre Company previously, and theirs is a particularly hard case."

Colonel Slade, commandant of the School of Musketry at Hythe (writes the Daily News of March 27), observes that, some technical difterences apart, every European Power is now rapidly arming with the same type of rifle, having practically the same range and rapidity of fire. As the new rifle is sighted up to 3500 yds, with smokeless powder, he assumes that in the future fire will, under certain circumstances, be opened at much greater ranges than has hitherto been customary. In the recently issued " Infantry Drill," rifle fire from 1700 yds to 1800 yds is classed as unairaed, and useful field artillery fire is limited to 3000 yds. Recent experiments with the new field gun and the new rifle, however, foreshadow aimed and effective fire at distances very much iv excess of these. As far back as September 1888, detachments of nine men from the Ist Devon, Ist Suffolk, Ist Sussex, and Ist Battalion King's Royal Rifle Corps, made, it is stated, excellent practice at 2400 yds, and fair at 2800 yds, although the rifle was strange to them, and they had no previous experience of such firing. As regards modern field artillery, Colonel Slade tells us that good practice is now made up to 5000 yds, and even beyond.

A case of alleged dummyism will probably occupy the attention of the Land Board at its next meeting. The parties interested reside at Macraes. It is said that the evidence in support of the case is very strong.

Complaints are made by farmers in the North of Canterbury regarding the scarcity of trucks for the carriage of grain at small stations. A Methven farmer writes to a contemporary: — " Night after night you may see standing on the various platforms from five to 20 farmers at each btatiou waiting in hopes that some trucks might come up, and when two or three trucks do happen to arrive there is a regular fight for possession of them. The farmers have to load them themselves during the night, and then the loaded trucks are despatched to Christchurch the following morning at about 7 o'clock. Probably from 30,000 to 40,000 sacks of grain are standing out on these platforms exposed to the weather, and should a heavy south-wester come on, and last two or three days, the damage done in this one district would more than equal the sum which the Railway Commissioners claim to have saved on the administration of the railways throughout New Zealand."