PASSING NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 2413, 7 June 1900, Page 3

PASSING NOTES.

(From Saturday's Daily Times.)

Since the Mafeking news we take our continuous good fortune sedately. The annexation of the Free State, the passage of the Vaal, the occupation of Johannesburg, these wonders, that a month back were only dim and distant possibilities, leave our nerves unflurried. They are nothing more than our desert — debts owed to us by the Pates, and long overdue. Here and there during the last day or two a croaker has suggested that our luck may still be uncertain. The Boers may have retired, .luring us on, that they may cut in upon our communications as once before, south of Bloemfontein. The streets of Johannesburg may have been mined, and the British army, marching in triumphant, may be blown into the air. But if we are too full up of good things for frenzied jiibilation like that of ■ Mafeking Day and Ladysmith Day, we are just as little in the mood for pessimism. 1 And we listen very impatiently to the jeremiads of Home correspondents, whose cue just now seems to be to prove every other British general an imbecile and the war a record of blunders and disgraces. Possibly by this time they have altered their tune ; at the date of their last letters they were stifl , glooming over Spion' Kop. It is true that we have made blunders. One of the speakers at the Agricultural Hall last night quoted " Napoleon's trite saying that the successful general is not the one who makes no blunders, but the one who makes fewest and who quickest takes advantage of the blunders of his adversaries. Tried by this rule our British commanders, taking them altogether, will not come out badly, spite of their defeats. " Defeats,"' quotha ! — the word has no place in the^British record. Of defeats, in the sense in' which Salamanca, Vittoria, ■Leipsic, Waterloo, Sedan were defeats for the French, we have had riot one. This morning (Friday) the bells arc ring.ing for Pretoria — for Pretoria eoavdrnn r \ and Kruger in flight. Yes! Lhc lo^ii- or the situation is asserting itself at last. a r it was bound to do. The two" Boer republics at war with the British Empire vcre never anything more than a nut betvvcen the liammer and the anvil. Our qualms; . and doubts of three months back were ;i treason against common sense and national self -respect. That is a reason for moderating pur transports now. Are we then no

' very much surprised that we are winning? The Ladysmith relief and the Mafeking re- | lief were in a category apart—^especially j { Mafek'irig. That the littlest one, and the ; I loneliest one, should have held out 1 longest, should have been able to bang the _ ; Boers to the very last, and should wind up , ! by cajituring their crack righting man with j all his following — for this, I grant you, a \ I self-respecting Briton might justly go off . ! his head any day in the week. I have a ' ; sneaking admiration for the Mafeking Day _ ! telegram sent from a New South Wales ' | bush township — " Bourks drunk." Morally , ] reprehensible, the Bourke celebrations were * f at any rate thoroughgoing and unanimous. • There were no concealed pro-Boers riding , jin procession at Bourke. To-day, as bid- , den, we shall keep holiday for Pretoria, but 1 with the thought in our minds that there ■ | will have to be another Pretoria Day pre- ' j sently — when Lord Roberts, according to i his promise, leads in the Guards, when J j our recovered prisoners are safe -in camp, j ' and when the flag goes up over those . boasted fortifications that were to keep us j out for ever.

) Kruger, in his last reported advice to his ; ' panic-stricken burghers, recommends them ' to abandon their loot and betake them- J selves to prayer. If Kruger himself sets ' the example he will have a good de-xl to abandon. Kruger is a millionaire many J times over, and he didn't make his money J ■ in farming — albeit, according to statistics, j he is the owner of 197 farms. His millions are accurately described by his own word — loot. And loot is plunder. When the se-

crets of the prison house are disclosed it will be found that Kruger and his official ' ' gang have battened on the Outlanders and ( the mining industry to a pretty tune. ' Swindling is no name for it. Take one specimen transaction : — | The Selati Railway scheme was based on j a concession granted by the Raad to one of , its own members, Mr Barend J. Vorster, jun., , who, in return, made what he was pleased to j call " presents " to the members — American spiders. Cape carts, gold watches, shares in.i 1 the company to be floated, sums in cash. Mr j ! Kruger stated that he saw no harm in members , receiving presents. Debentures for half a j million were issued, guaranteed by the Govern- j ment, the company receiving £70 for each £100 j debenture. The "other £30 ?— Don't inquire! •' I Ths company arranged with a contractor to j build the railway at the maximum cost allowed j ' in the concession, ,£9600 per mile. Two days j later the contractor sub-let the contract for i £7002 per -mile. Length of line, 200 miles ; J consequent dimensions of the " steal," £519,600. j (See Fitzpafcrick's " Transvaal from Within "). | i All this at the expense of the taxpayer — ( that is, the Outlander. The dynamite j monopoly alone robbed the mining industry , el £600,000 a year, out of which Mr J. M. J ' A. Woolmarans, member of the Executive, as a consideration for his support in the Executive Council, "was allowed to appro- i priate, as his own private loot, £10,000 a j year. If Kruger is penitent for himself as j well as for his accomplices, he should dis- j ■ gorge his millions, walk into the British I camp and give himself up, requesting to be ' deported to St. Helena for the rest of his , scandalous life. | We, too, are getting a big railway concession just now ; not on the^Transvaal pat- | tern, it is true — we don't do such things in , 1 this country ; yet, withal, there is some- I thing " dickey "' about it. Mr Ward and i the Ministry pose as benevolent deities, j | who, of their mere goodness, are going to . reduce fares and freights, at the same time ; accelerating services, and generally improv- I '■ ing railway matters all round. In these ! bei'eficent operations the department con- j sents to sacrifice £75,000 a year. Very j good — and thank you for nothing ! The : . £75,000 a year, and another £75,000 at the j back of that, had previously been taken out ! - of the, pockets of the iiublic by unnecessary j ' charges — with a view to the annual Sed- j donian " surplus." Moreover, whilst levy- ! . ing unnecessary charges upon the public, < ; our Ministerial benefactors have been stary- | ing the railways — still with a view to sur- j i pluses, of course. To such a pass have they • brought things that Mr Ward acknowledges ! the need of increasing the present rolling stork by 40 engines, 3000 waggons, and 140 civs. Oi Mich urgency is this need that the l'dilciv shops will be unable to meet it, and j Mr Ward contemplates purchases outside ! the colony — a thing to be abhorred, I j should. have thought, by all true ! " Liberals," and in particular by the Labour j Unions. Taking everything into eonsidera- ' lion, the public gratitude for this great l'ail- , way reform need not be excessive. Per- ; sonally I shall decline to be grateful at all. : 1 fciiuce \thty js urogerly returned to my

pocket had first been improperly taken out, where is the need?

Writes a correspondent of the Daily Times : —

A question has arisen here which part of the circumference of a wheel travels the more quickly, the top or the bottom. We would be obliged if you would, through your columns, give us an answer, and, if possible, a reason. Hare, bobbing up serenely, I recognise a discredited acquaintance of long ago. This controversy about the revolving wheel is as old probably as the bubonic plague ; the Anglo-Israel absurdity is not more irrationally persistent. Like both, it intermits — appears, rages for a time, disappears ; but it is not dead. The chances are that it is not even sleeping. It has merely departed for pastures new ; no sooner are we at rest from it than editors under other skies are being implored to say whether the top of a coach wheel does or does not move faster than the bottom. Our turn has come again ; there are signs that the silly season is upon us. An Anglo-Israelite is lecturing in the Choral Hall on the moral and political implications of the lump of limestone which Edward I brought from Scone to Westminster, and which the prophet Jeremiah, or Joseph of Arimathea, or some other likely person, had previously carried to Ireland, and which, originally, the patriarch Jacob, running away from the consequences of his misdeeds, selected as his pillow the night he slept out in the desert. In virtue of this stone we beat the French at Waterloo, put down the Mutiny, lelieved Ladj-pmith, captured Cronje, are this vei'y day marching into Johannesburg, and shall presently hoist the red. white, and blue on Mr Kruger's private flagstaff at Pretoria. A veritable lucky stone this Jacob's pillow ! But I must get back to the revolving wheel.

Besought for light on this momentous question — Does the top of a ooach wheel move faster than the bottom? — the editor of the Times wisely invoked Mr Beverly, who, on subtleties of this nature, speaks as from the laurel and the tripod of Apollo. Appeal from MiBeverly there is none. To a Diraedin man the mere suggestion savoxirs of impiety. A true believer would as soon think of appealing against a text in the Koran, or a erocd Catholic against a Vatican decree. Henceforth Mr Beverly's mana will be greater than ever. His solution of the great wheel conundrum r-hows him to be not only a mathematician but a humourist.

The bottom of a carriage wheel, being in contact with the road, is motionless, therefore the top must move at twice the rate of the carriage. Note the delicious non sequitnr in the " therefore "' clause. The bottom of the wheel stand still ; " therefore " the top moves twice as fast as something else!

There must have been a satirical twinkle in Mr Beverly's eye as he indited this. But the principal fun is in the main clause : "the. bottom of a carriage wheel, being in contact Avith the road, is motionless." Everybody knows, nobody knows better than Mr Beverly, that every point in the circumference of a rotating ircle- moves at exactly the same rate as any other point. The rim of a wheel moves altogether, if it move at all ; hence, if the point "at which it touches the ground is motionless, the opposite point must also be motionless, and every other point as well. Further, since at every instant of its progress some point must be in contact with the ground, and therefore " motionless,"' at every instant the whole wheel is motionless ; whereby we see that the true paradox of a moving ■wheel is that it doesn't move at all! MiBeverly adds, sententiously :

This is the common-3ense view of the question, but some are so constituted that they cannot take a, conimon-senso view if another can be found. Delivering this, the oracle Avinks — ironically. I take the tip. and shall construe his solution, as intended, by the rule of contrary, not forgetting to bless his unsuspected gift of humour.

The members of the Rivera Commission proceeded to Milton on Thursday, and yesterday were engaged in inspecting the land in the vicinity of Glenore. The inspection of properties adjacent to the Tokoinairiro River will bo continued till Wednesday next, w.hen f the evidoncp will be taken of claimants for compensation and those inieuested in milling in rpgard to the propoied proclamation^ pj the rivg? as a sludge chan-

nel. The claimants number about 65, and the aggregate of the amounts claimed totals up a very considerable sum.

Our Alexandra correspondent telegraphs that AVcir's barber's shop was broken into on Thursday night, and three or four watches and- a silver chain stolen.

Referring to the proposed extension of the Catlins railway to Ratanui, Mr Thomson, M.H.S., has received a letter from the Minister of Public "Works stating that the work will be put in hand shortly.

Mr Robert Duncan, the principal engineer, surveyor, and chief inspector of machinery for this colony, hat! been elected a member of the Institute of Naval Architects, London.

There is a coal famine in Welling ion. The hulks in the harbour are nearly empty, and merchants' supplies are so. low that orders cannot be filled.

At Cross's Creek, at the foot of the Rimutaka, there is a haunted cottage which no one cares to occupy. Some time ago (says the New Zealand Times) the Railway department, a correspondent slates, had it renovated and re-painted for the benefit of a

newly-married couple, but the operative and his spouse indignantly refused to spend their honeymoon in such an uncanny place. The cottage has the evil repute of being inhabited by silent hosts innumerable, and in all probability it will have to be purified by fire.

As showing the amount of capital invested in the dredging industry in New Zealand, the Wellington representative of a southern firm of consulting engineers informed a New Zealand Times representative on Monday that his firm had let contracts for dredges amounting to £143,270, that the estimated cost of dredges about to te tendered for was £82,100, and that 55 more dredges are being designed, the cost of which will be on the average about £7000.

The Berlin correspondent of the Morning Leader states tii^t in spite of. the vigilance of the authorities, quite an epidemic of duels have taken place- in ihe neighbourhood of Berlin, principally between officers and students. ' Yesterday afternoon, however, a duel between ladies v'as fought, which is certainly a novelty for Berlin, and shows how emancipated German ladies have become. The affair took placs in a forest on the outskirts of the city, whero the parties arrived on bicycle?. The weapons chosen were fine fencing swords, and the duel was carried out according to all the rules of the game. One lady was wounded in the hip, and taken away in a carriage. A love affair is said to have been the cause of the duel. One of the duellists is a wellknown Berlin beauty.

In connection with several applications that came before the Olulha County Council on Friday from settlers at Catlins for works to be done out of " thirds " and " fourths," Cr Saunders mentioned that at a public meeting held at Owakfi it had been decided to apply to the Minister of Lands for a special audit of the "thirds" and "fourths" account, and, this being- so, the application was held over pending the result of the audit. It is alleged that the " thirds " and " fourths " have not been expended according to law.

The contrast between 1E93 and 1900 in regard to the status of Lord Roberts and the place he occupied then "and now is so extraordinary that it calls for remark. In 1£93, when he returned from Irdia at the end of his prolonged tenure of the post of Commander-in-Chief, he was looked upon, and no doubt thought himself, a very ill-used and disappointed pei son. He knew, and naturally better than anyone else (says "To-day") that lie was still full of life and go, despite his 60 odd years. Yet he had but little hope — it grew to be almost no hope — of commands or appointments. There were influences hostile ro him in Pall Mall. He had been offered by Mr Stanhope, when War Minister, the post of adjutant-genera.? of the army, and had accept I'd it, but lie was never allowed to hold it. "Whoa the vacancy oocurred, as it did. on the rotu'omc-nb of Lovd "WoJscley, in 18S0, Lord Roneits fully e-peeted the fulfilment oE IVlv Rlanhops's promise, but it was evaded, and Sir "Hech err. Buller was appointed. Tlieie were august personages who did not wan I to sco Lord Roberts at, lh« War Ofr.cc. and who uo atronuouiJy opposed Mr Stanhope %f to foves iiiza to gc back pa his word. The

result was that extension of Roberta's Indian command which kept him there till 1893, and then landed him in England with the almost certain knowledge that he was to go upon the shelf. When at length he got the Irish command, it was no more than a tardy recognition of his undoubted claims, but he was at the same time plainly told that he need look for no more, least of all for that reversion to the post of Commander-in-Chief of the army which it will probably be within his power to take or leave in November next.

It was made evident in more than one direc* tion on Friday that a few individuals were out of touch with that splendid spirit whiKi actuated the large crowds who demonstrated their joyfulness at the good news to hand cst Ladysmith and Mafeking Days. Some of thess persons — mostly hobbledehoys — made thermselves obnoxious by " baiting " an unfortunate woman who had imbibed too freely. Probably the same individuals were r»* sponsible for the damage done to the fittings at the Agricultural Hall during ihe meeting. Two fire-hose attachments were broken of? the walls, a wooden ventilator was pullaa down, a door was smashed, the water in the centre exit passage upstairs was turned on, and in the machinery court annexe the tap of the large water pipe was broken off, cave--ing a portion of the building to be - floodet?. These are octs so out of keeping with the general spirit which prevailed among the thousands of men, women, and children who paraded ihe streets throughout the clay that it is to be hoped the perpetrators will be discovered and punished.

It' seems improbable that a strict adherence to the law and the subsequent adoption of the most proper and legitimate methods should lead to disorderly conduct and a series of police cases, but this happened in Dunedin recently. A man, who was apparently under the influence of liquor, went to Mr Watson's Hotel on Friday afternoon and demanded to be served. The licensee, observing his condition, very properly refused to allow him to got more liquor, and beeatise of this refusal the man became violent and commenced to break things. Then tho request was made that he should leave the premises, and this he declined to do. Of course nothing could be dono but to ask the police to effect his removal, and in the resistance which follo-«"ed aa. onlooker took part, kicked one of the constables, and endeavoured io incite the crowd to attack the police. The result was that five charges were heard at the Police Court on Saturday, all of which to some extent were traceable to the fact that the holder of a publican's license was determined not to sell alca holic liquor to a man who was already uncle. its influence.

After the trials with the system Oi telegraphy invented by Messrs Pollak and Vireig, when between 70,000 and 100,000 words were telegraphed to Berlin in one hour (writes rhe Vienna correspondent of the Daily News), the inventors were summoned to America, by a Chicago cable company to make triala there. These experiments have succeeded equally well. Between places distant from each other from 400 to 1000 kilometres, they ha-s c succeeded, \ising weak currents, in getting through, on an average, from £0,000 to 100,000 words in an hour. In oue case — between Chicago and Milwaukee — ■ they obtained 155,000 words in an hour, the .signs still clear enough to be easily rea£. The last trial wa« made between New Yoi& and Chicago, the messages being sent from the first-named place by one of the inventors and received in the second by the other. In this case the weather was as unfavourable as it well could be, yet 65,000 words %ero sent and received in one hour. The American experiments took some time, and the inventors could not apply themselves for somS months to the completion of their work. It has been said before that they intended making some practical improvements in the? apparatus, and the photographic parts were to be so constructed as to make a dark room for the development of the signals on sensitive paper unnecessary. They have now cart ried out all that they had proposed to themselves. The signals which the tiny mirroo reflects .upon sensitive paper fall upon a nai--. row endless band of such paper, which ro«) faces and gradually sinks lower, passing through a developing fluid and then out of ai.-i opening in the apparatus ready for imme*' diate ygsa