PASSING NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 3315, 26 September 1917, Page 3

PASSING NOTES.

(Fiom Saturday's Daily Times.) The climb-down of the Government on the Six O'Clock Closing question _ means much more than Six O'Clock Closing. It means that their Highnesses the New Zealand Oligarchs have received a lesson. They have been called back to the ABC of democracy and constitutional government. In the house I inhabit a master and mistress (if the terms may pass) pay wages to Miss Judith M'Graw and Miss Gwendoline Arabella Jackson-Thompson, appointed to offices and administrations therein. And it may very well be that Judy and Gwen establish a tyranny under which their employers groan but cannot escape. Not so, however, outside the purely domestic circle. In this country the people are masters; and the people will not permit their servants to boss them. Who are the Masseys and the Wards but servants appointed bV the people, paid by the people, responsible to the people, and, what is more—removable by the people? Listening to talk in Parliament this week you might suppose the people of New Zealand to be children, and might look with awe on the Masseys and the Wards as their Heaven-appointed tutors and governors. The children crave this and cry for that, not knowing what is good for them. But the Masseys and the Wards know, and will bless as much in what they withhold as in what they give. In like manner every lesser Parliament man imagines himself —on his £3OO a year and while it lasts —an irresponsible satrap. All of which is a bad plagiarism from Potsdam and the Ilohenzollerns. Thanks, however, to the whip that press and platform have cracked about their ears, they have bethought themselves, and only just in time, Henceforth our servants, however fat their pay —it ranges J believe from £SOO to £ISOO —will better know their place, We are all aware—and Russia is the palmary example>—that not every people Is capable of democracy. British capacity in this behoof comes of long training. We got our done centuries ago, and have been plodding step by step ever since. It sometimes seems a question whether America, for all its talk about democracy, is really democratic. Presi-

dent Wilson lifts up his prohibitive voice and, 10, through every State and Territory the manufacture of whisky stops on the instant. Where can you match an autocracy like that? True, the President who rules everything is himsplf ruled by the Constitution; —" the earth revolves on her own axletree wonst in 24 hours, —subject, to the Constitooshun of the United States," says Artemus Ward. But there is sometimes a way out:—"What the divvle is the Constitution between frinds?" remarked the Tammany boss, confidentially, to President Roosevelt. Democrat, autocrat, what you will—President Wilson rules with a high hand and a stretched-out arm. No less strong a man can save Russia. Kerensky may be that man. The presumption Is in his favour since he i 3 where he is. He must be the fittest, for he survives. I hoped that Korniloff might be the man, as having the firmer nerve. But one never knows. There is a deep philosophy in the saying, Nothing succeeds like success. The democrat to succeed in Russia in the present stage of Russia's development, must be the democrat who in spirit and method most nearly approaches the deposed and vanished C2ar.

Betting on the chances of Lord Kitchener's survival—an issue on which huge sums have been staked, say the cables—argues the possession of more money than I wit. There is a sort of indecency about j it, too. Betting on the King's life is or I used to be high treason. And when any ! man, gentle or simple, is certainly dead, betting on the chances of his reappearing is at the least in villainous bad taste. The idea at the back of this betting is that the Germans hold Lord Kitchener as a prisoner of war and keep it dark. Well, they certainly keep it dark. On the same principle they might capture Verdun and keep it dark, —or Paris, or the Channel ports, or Sir Douglas Haigj or might snap up Admiral Beatty from his own quarter-deck by an air machine and similarly kidnap Mr kloyd George;— always keeping it dark. The motive for concealment would be just as good in these cases as in the other, —that is, there would be no motive at all. And the achievement —the actual keeping it dark—would be just as impossible. If Kitchener were in Germany the fact would blaze to heaven. Nobody could keep it dark. And as for wanting to keep it dark, —well, the simple-minded Hun since he started the war by marching through Belgium in the belief that Britain would not interfere has followed up that colossal blunder by many and many another, but with none so preposterous as this. Kitchener exhibited to the world ( as prize of war would be worth more to his captors than a i battle won.

j As to the manner of Lord' Kitchener's ! tragio exit, we know beyond possibility of doubt that the war ship Hampshire carrying him was destroyed at sea. In common belief the enemy had a hand in it. Somehow, by espionage, treachery, or the fatuous garrulity of a British official, Potsdam had got wind of the mission to Russia and took measures accordingly. A submarine lay waiting in the Hampshire's path. The fatuous garrulity hypothesis finds readiest credence, says ihe National ' Roview. '' In tho opinion of a large and not decreasing number of people Lord Kitchener wa3 unwittingly to death by indiscretions of which Downing Street was at the time believed to be the centre." Over and over again departmental officials have been staggered on hearing casually at lunch or dinner more or less accurate references to matters so far only discussed by themselves, their chiefs, and the inmost ring of the Cabinet.

If that was the way of it, we have to lament in the Kitchener tragedy not only the loss of a great soldier and' great public servant, along with a- ship's company of near 700 men, but also, alas,

The deep damnation' of his taking-off. But there is an alternative opinion—that

under pressure of urgency, driving along in heavy weather, fog, and dark, the Hampshire ripped (her bottom! out on some ragged spur of the Orkneys. This way or the other it must have been. The Admiralty knows, perhaps, but the Admiralty keeps a shut mouth and tight lip. In either case no doubtful issue is left for us to gamble on. Kitchener sleeps full fathom! five, his secret with him—until the sea gives up her dead.

"Like many others, he had inflicted on him a communication from the Pro'testanfc Press Bureau enclosing samples of shaving-papers and pipe-lights disguised as Protestant tracts." —N.Z. Tablet, August 16. Dear "Civis," —Can you throw any ligjfit on the nature of the, apparently, diabolical articles mentioned above, and why should they require disgufjsing in that extraordinary manner?

The Tablet, living in a world of upsidedown, and seeing men as trees walking, has got tl\is thing tho wrong way about. It wasn't that shaving-papers and pipelights were disguised as Protestant tracts, but that Protestant tracts were disguised as shaving-paper and pipe-lights. For the peaceful penetration of Roman Catholic households, we are to suppose, —households unapproachable by open attack. A Protestant propaganda by means of shav-ing-papers and pipe-lights! It doesn't sound very convincing, even though we add what De Quincey—always a reckless jokester —calls paper designed for "culinary and post-culinary uses." But apparently the Tablet believes in it.

Dear "Civis," —In your Passing Notes (respecting which, in passing, I would like to say I trust thoy will not pass, for I, like many others, never paiss them) to-day you make the statement "a Government, however much itself a joke, is constitutionally incapable of joking-.'/ That may be so, but I have carried' around in my pocketbook for some time a nice little Government joke that perhaps you may not havo seen.

The jofee is an advertisement for tenders for the purchase of some second-hand saddlery, etc. j and, as you will see from the cutting enclosed, the gallant major who sign 3 the notice informs the British public- that "Tho lowest or any tender not necessarily accepted."—Your appreciative Constant Readeb.

True enough, the gallant major (name not essentia], I spare his blushes) hints that in trafficking with the Defence Department for the purchase of disused saddlery, the higher you bid the less likely you are to get it. The department may not accept tho lowest offer, — not necessarily, but it's leaning is that way. This is war time, we wallow iu borrowed millions; saving is no object. Either that, or, as my correspondent suggests, the Defence Department shows a welcome gleam of unconscious humour.

What precisely is the malady called "flat-foot"? I ask, not as fearing myself to'be of the platypus tribe ("platypus " means, I believe, flat-footed) but in commiseration of the 70 per cent of English women whos it is affirmed are m that condemnation —convicted by the short skirt. Time was when a novelist might say "a tiny foot peeped out below her dress," or even " she displayed a neatturned ankle." "But," writes "Moralist, M.D.," in the National Review, July number —" at the present time a woman is considered correct so long as she does not display her knees. Good or bad, this is due to the short skirt, and I know my place well enough to prevent my attacking the present fashion, which may be a chilly one, but it certainly allows freedom of movement and discourages dirt." And so say all of us. Nevertheless —

If on August 1, 1915 (Registration Day] every woman had been compelled by law to be snapshotted from behind as she walked and have her photograph attaohed to her registration oard, the present fashion would have been killed by women themselves in two months from that date. Soon wo should have learned in private conversations and women's weekly newspapers that "really these 6kirts are very unbecoming. Miss A. would say, "I can't think how dear Mrs B. with such feet can wear a short skirt;" Mrs C, "I am thankful I havo not such wretched ankles as Miss D." . , . Heading his article, "Deformed Feet in Women," this writer up by one critic as " ungallant but candid n affirms that " Plat-foot exists in at least 70 per cent of women between 15 and 45." And his conclusion : —Either lengthen tho skirt and conceal it, or adopt a system of vigorous "foot-drill" to correct it. Frankly, Jam puzzled. Here in Dunedin, looking so far as it is becoming in me to look at what the short skirt reveals, I see only well arched Insteps, with ankles tidy and trim that sit neatly on the three-inch heels. Flat-foot cannot yet have invaded the antipodes, thanks be. Dear "Oivis," —Will you kindly give the correct pronunciation of "Marama," name of one Of out hospital ships. Probably nine out of ten persons pronounce it with the ad-

cent on the second syllable instead of, as I believe It should be, with the Jrnsi syllable only sb'ghtly accentuated. I have no. Maori dictionary at hand, and should not feel bound by it if I had. In relation to the literary languages Maor| is barbarous, and has no rights. We ar* not in the least bound to pronounce & Maori word as the Maoris pronounced i&. Wo do not even pronounce a French worqi as the French pronounce it. Paris we say, sounding the s, not Pared j with the Frenchman. English is mistress in her own house. Usage, slowly denni» ing itself, determines the pronunciation oi Maori place-names. No one gives " Oamaru " four syllables; " Wakatip '*- may displace " Wakatipu," aa in UuS North Island " Wairarap •" tends to dis^ flaco " Wairarapa " —in the district itself have heard even "Waidrap." Anq who shall say whether "Manuka" is metrically identical with '' forsook her'' o# with "pannikin?" English tendency is to throw tho accent back ; hence " Marama," however the Maoris pronounced it, is mars likely to end with the accent on the firsi syllable than on the second. : t Civis.