PASSING NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 2603, 3 February 1904, Page 5

PASSING NOTES.

(Froni Saturday's Daily Times.)

The Chamberlain campaign ,_ bound tLough it be to inflame the passions, to wreck

political parties, to sever friendships, is being handled with amazing good humour by the caricaturists. Mr F. Carruthers Gould pillories Mr Chamberlain every ether day in the Westminster Gazette, yet with never a touch of malice. Alice in Wonderland, with J.C. as the Mad Hatter, is one of F.C.G.'s staple themes, varied according to tke varying phases of the tariff argument from day to day. You may always get a laugh out of it; probably J.C. laughs himself ; indeed I think it not unlikely that he collects the Mad Hatter cartoons for preservation in an album. But tho politicians, I regret to notice, make -ap in spitefulness any deficiencies of tli9 caricaturists. What Mr W. T. Stead says of the Chamberlain programme is not for repetition here, and may be left to the imagination. It pained me, however, to find Mr Frederick Greenwood, a political writer who is poles asunder from Stead, imputing to Mr Chamberlain bad motives — the " buying out the ambition of certain great colonies for independence " ( !) and the diverting of public attention from the War Report. Of a worse type still are the insinuations of Mr Lloyd-George :

Mr Chamberlain had cleared out of it [the Ministry] with that instinct which belonged to his type. He saw tCie ship was sinking, and he cleared off He had managed very adroitly, however, to take out of the business all the capital that was left — and the Government was absolutely bankrupt. Mr Chamberlain had oleared, but he had left tho "' man in possession " ; the son was the boy on the burning deck — the modern Casabianca. He was there bravely sinking with the ship in obedience to his father's orders. As Campbell-Bannerman and Vernon Harcourt are sometimes no better than this, I draw a painful inference — namely, that party fairness in British politics is sadly to seek. We are at this moment despatching to Britain our Mr Bedford for the correcting of his political manners ; but if he learns of the Liberals Jie wiil bring back a worse vocabulary than his own.

In depreciation of the Chamberlain style of platform address, a tolerably successful style, we have paragraphs such as this, in which the spite is about equal to the stupidity :

Mt Chamberlain used sometimes, in the old days, to be subjected to the lude test of having to rise and address a j'ubhc meeting m immediate succession to Mr Bright. His style of oiatoiy was quite different fiom that of his illustrious colleague, and the contrast was sometimes too sharp to be effective. Once, when Mr Bright had ended with a peroration that soared to the highest flights of eloquence, Mr Chamberi lam rose and opened his haiangue with the words, " As the red-nosed man said in ' Pickwick ' ." But he was allowed to get no ( further. Even Birmingham declined to accept that anti-climax ; and a fresh start had to be made. I should say that Mr Chamberlain's opening sentence was exquisitely adapted to the feituation. Mr Brijrht's oratory in its peroration stage had the solemnity and unction of a ssrmon. An evangelical preacher, pious and faithful, might work himself up through long progressions to the same degree of impref-sivene&s ; but to begin at any such level would be possible to no man. John Bright himself couldn't have begun as he left off. What chance, then, for a sueaker coming immediately after him? The only thing to do was what Mr Chamberlain did — disenchant the audience, bring them back to earth, and sanity, and common sense. "As the rednosed man said in ' Pickwick ' " ; that v. as the true rhetoric for the situation ; Cicero ouldn't have hit the right note more nor Demosthenes. The Crown Prince of Prus&ia. who is also Imperial Crown Prince of all Germany, > rfiDorted -to be in trouble with papa.

We may assume at once the existence of faults on 'both sides. His High Mightiness Kaiser William is the kind of papa with whom a son rising twenty, or thereabouts, would be likely to have troubie. Theie is no reason to suppose the Kaiser a domestic bully after the pattern set by his predecessor Frederick William I. But undoubtedly he is a martinet ; wife and children, in common with everybody else about him, have been drilled, disciplined, dragooned into due subjection. But in a young man rising twenty nature and adolescence bsgin to assert themselves, particularly if he is a Crown Prince. According to Berlin gossip this Crown Prince has been so much kept in the background that lie might walk the streets by the hour without meeting any human being who would recognise him. He is thought to be modest and good-natured, and he is not known to be vicious. All the same he wanted to marry an American girl, and he has been present at dramatic performances that satirised the army ; moreover, unle&s a reasonable private liberty is conceded him he threatens to " reside in England." From the Kaiser's point of view all this is flat blasphemy and worse. It is unnatural rebellion, lese majesty, high treason. The offences for which the brutal father of Frederick the Great (that was to be) tried him by courtmartial and desired to have him shot were hardly more heinous. Frederick wrote verses, played the flute, and ran away from home, having the intention, he also, to "reside in England." The Crown Prince of to-day is following very illustiious precedent, and will be following it still if he repents and submits. Papa also may learn from the annals of his house a lesson or two applicable to the present juncture. One can hardly imagine him consenting to be bracketed in history with the father of Frederick as an example of domestic tyranny. That wouldn't suit him at all.

In the Labour Journal, "issued under the direction of the Right Hon. R. J. Seddon, Minister of Labour," is a sweetly pretty idyl of the Premier's domestic simplicity. It seems that a Frenchman, M. Felicien Challaye, who is described as " Professor of Philosophy at the Popular University of Evreux,"' recently passed tln-ough Wellington and was entertained at the Premier's private house. After re-

turning to Evreux he reciprocated by a lecture on " The * Paradise of Workmen: New Zealand," which lecture is now reported in the New Zealand Labour Journal. The founder of this Paradise is Mr Seddon — plain Mr Seddon :

Richard Seddon, still, indeed, First Minister (President of the Council) in New Zealand, a real workman — first a miner in England, then a miner in New Zealand, then the keeper of a small publichouse, then a member of Parliament, a Minister of the Crown, and Premier; a man remarkable for his energy and for his practical wisdom. So far good, barring the little French mistake about " President of the Council." What is better, however, is a passage describing the democratic modesty with which this great man entertains distinguished strangers :

At Wellington (he says) I was invited to dine on Sunday evening at the house of the aged Prime Minister, who occupies one of the highest positions in the colony. It was his son who ■opened the, door; it was his daughter, assisted by a friend, who wait-sd at table. In a word, they si- owed clearly the customs of equality in this new country. The suggestion seems to be that the Seddonskeep no menials ; they "do their own work." Mr Seddon's son — to whom as " military expert " I fancy we pay a considerable serew — opens the door for visitors ; Mr Seddon's daughter, assisted by a friend, waits at table ; what other member of the family it is that in the kitchen cooks the dinner and dishes it up, respect forbids me to speculate ; but I feel no reluctance in suggesting that possibly R.J.S 1 . himself peels the potatoes and shells the peas. It is not poverty that constrains to these economies ; far from that, very far indeed. The motive, as the Frenchman perceived, was to exhibit " the customs of equality " that obtain in this new and happy country. And that is why his accoant is republished in Mr Seddon's official Labour Journal.

The Dutch law courts are just now working out a case which is mere undiluted Gilbert and Sullivan. Attached to the municipal hospital of Amsterdam is "an incubator for the rearing of infants." I copy the»e terms .verbatim from an English paper ; probably what we should understand from them is that the Amsterdam hospital has a foundling department. " Soms time ago a citizen sent a male child of bis to be placed in the incubator, but on attending at the hospital to receive it back he was tendered a female child." " Tendered " is good ; there seems an implication that the authorities, conscious of their inability to make exact restitution, were ~ offering a compromise ; they " tendered " a female child as a try on. But tho faithful parent stood to his claim ; it was a male infant he had handed in to be incubated ; it was a male infant he vas entitled to get out again. .Strange to say, th© municipal foundling department declared itself unable to satisfy this demand, and, " despite searching inquiries, no trace of the missing male infant could be discovered." There would seem to be a damaging inference against municipal management in an industry of this nature. Tramways, gas and water, abattoirs and cemeteries, we m-iy leave to be mismanaged, more or less, by a mayor and his synagogue of councillors ; but the incubating of inlunt citiz-ens — no i Official carelessness "« ould "mix those children up," and bankiupt the ratepayers in defending actions for damages. This is happening in the Dutch

The- father sued the aulkoiuies joi the return of his child, and after v protracted heamig won his action, the cotut declaring that the child tendered to him va= the wiong or.c. Now he is suing foi damages ior the l^ss he has sustained by reason of the siuthouues' failure to hand him hi° rrai rluld, and tins ;3; 3 the point shortly to com: befuia the JrgLc-t Dukh tribunal for deosioi..

The whole Imsim-hs is JJutdi Mid doableDutch in an eminent ilpgioa,

" Licence " with ac, or license with an s, which should it be? This question, propounded the other day in the correspondence columns of the Daily Times, ha 3 nothing to do with the prohibition controversy, nor is it answered by saying that we want no license at all. For the purposes of the "No-license" banner itself we certainly ought to know how the word should be spelled. And apparently that is precisely what we do not know. It is the same with "license" as it is with '"practise"; there are two spellings, each, of which is as good as the other, and as bad. If we limited the c form to " licence " and " practice. " as nouns, and the s form to the same Arords as verbs, we should ba helping to perfect the English language. We should be doing what has already beendone in analogous cases; e.g., advice anct advise, device and devise, prophecy and pi'ophesy. When a void in the same spell' ing may be either noun or verb we marl the two uses by different accents ; thu export, import, survey, peifume, convoy escort, etc., as nouns are accented on th &r«t> syllable, as verbs on tlte secono Where no shifting of accent is possibly we keep two spellings — one for each use-< as in the- examples given above. Th 4 odd thing about our handling of " licencs " and "practice" is, that having the two spelling*?, we neglect to limit each to one use. Probably we shall go on neglecting. Literature has neither pope nor emperor ; nor has English literature the next besi> thing — nnmely, an Academy of Letters with authority to correct anomalies such as this. They manage these things better in France.

TEe district health officer, Djr Ogston, has just returned from a 12 days' official visifc to the Otago Central district, and visiting Naseby, St. Bathans, Cambrians, Ophir, Clyde, Cromwell, Pembroke, and Arrowtown, and many of the smaller intermediat* townships. At Naeeby Dr Ogston found things to be in a much improved condition as com* pared with what they were on his last visify and was struck with the possibilities of tboi defunct mining township of Cambrians from the consumptive sanatorium point of view. Ophir chiefly attracted attention, by reason of a very bad open drain running acrosra tha township, while the condition of the school and of iho water supply left a good deal of room for improvement. At Clyde Di? Ogston conferred with the county engineer and chairman of the Vincent County Council, and attention will be given to certain matters as a result. Dr Ogston expresses himself ss very well satiefied with the resultf of his tour, -unhch is the first he has made officially of this particular district. Afl every place he vi.^ted he found individuals keen to draw hie attention to matters more or less within hio province.

The annual examinations aeld by tho Mines Department of New Zealand begani at the Normal School cm the 26th ulfc. Six candidates are sitting for first-class mine managers' certificates and four for second class under tho Coal Mines Act, two for first class in>no managers' and two fop battery superintendents' under the Mining Act. The examinations extend over a period of four days, and are being held simultaneously at Reeston, Thames, and Dunedin.

A well-known hostelry, the Coa^' and Hordes Hotel, at Fairfield, owned am. •ecupied by Mr John Tansey, was completely, destroyed by fire on Monday, the 25th. Whemi discovered the fire had a good hold, and nothing could be done to save the building 1 , while only a few chairs, a eewing machine, and two b-icyoko could be got out of the« house. It appears that Mrs Tanscy, who was the last to retire, went to bed oboub 10.30, at which tima everything seemed safe. Two hours later shf was awakened, and found that her room waa filled with dense emoko. The hotel, which was a twostorey wooden building, containing 1* rooms, was insured in the Phcenix office for £400, and the stock in the same- office for £370.-

Recently a description appeared in these columns of a sparrow-trap, which, it was claimed, was the invention of Mr Norman, of Winton. Mr B. Stuart, ranger, Ashburton, writes to us to cay that the trap as described is his invention, and iva,: patented ,by him on the 4-th November, 1902. It gained the Ashburton County Council's priza of £5 for the beet trap, and was also exhibited at Oamaru and Dun* edin.

It is stated that an Otago farmer wiil probably be prosecuted on a charge o{ harbouring some boys who recently absconded from the Industrial School af Caversharn.

There are often in country distiicfcs imiqu* and interesting gatherings, and the picni< at Hyde on the 25th, was one, when thre( generations of people gathered in th< picturesque little plot of ground on whioft. stands the Hyde School. Mr E. Boyd, io\ instance, has been a member of ihe School Committee for about 25 years ; the chair< man of lha committee (Mr T. Ramsay) ( nhose children are now attending the schoolwas one of the first boje to sit at a school desk in Hyde: and Mr J. J. Ramsa.i who was ilioie that day. lias the fir*t b_v on* lolled as o- scholar of ihe first school, about the vt-ar 1569.

Ou ihe f,'tce of tho Keck and Pillar Mountain, about three- or four miles below Hyde,Lheri.' stands i huge broadleaf tree. It can be so.en for miles around, and is now quita a kuidmaik. having- stood there since tha advent of the oldest identity. The peculiarity about this tree is that it grows out! of a crovico in a. Hugo rock, and covers as mi.eh gi-ouud as an ordinary-sized farmhouse. Although the lulls and spurs are devoid of timber, *'l ih,* little creeks in •. hai di.-ariet sro overgrown, with native ahrubs aad trees of all kind*