CURREN TOPICS.

Southland Times, Issue 16785, 13 July 1911, Page 5

CURREN TOPICS.

wives rsr japan. No English or American girl should aver intermarry with one of the Japanese race; all her training and habits are dead against such a proceeding. To the maiden the three vows of obedience to which the woman of Japan bows her beautifully coiffured head would seem like a nightmare, or else a screaming farce. The dainty little Jap has to practise unswerving, unmurmuring obedience to her father as long as she dwells under his roof. When she quits her home for that of her husband, she has to swear the same stern vow to her husband and his parents, and —thought of unmixed horror —even to the wife of her husband’s elder brother; and then, added to all these visions of constant kow-towing, she has, on the death of her husband, to swear unswerving obedience to her son, or sons, if she lias them. It does not sound as if it were exactly the thing for the modern girl. Divorce in Japan is so easy, should the wife fail to And favour in her husband’s eyes: and the position of a divorced wife is unpleasant everwhere. particularly in Japan, and she can be divorced for such trivial reasons—for talking too much, for jealousy, for not being sufficiently demure and thankful, when words of reproof or of advice are administered to her. with the best intentions, no doubt, by her husband's relatives. There are less trivial pretexts for divorce, of course, such as loving another man better than her husband, loving not wisely but too wedi, or for failing to present her lord and master with little replicas of his neat little Japanese self; but these little laws, of course, hold good, more or less, everywhere. The position of women is no doubt improving in Japan: nevertheless the woman in Japan, no matter what her social position, is regarded more or less from the point of view of a chief slave. The wife waits on her husband at meals, listens with meekly bowed head to the words of wisdom of her better half, and salaams in a lowly fashion ac his approach and departure. Should her husband doom her too beautiful for safety, he makes her dye her little pearly teeth, and one receives quite a shock when one becomes the recipient of a whole-hearted Japanese smile from a wedded beauty so defaced. Of course, among the upper classes, and those who have travelled or sojourned in strange lands, where the social ■ laws regarding women are less barbarous, the position of women has greatly changed, and they are Treated more like reasoning, thinking human beings. WEEEE MILLIONS LOOK SMAZ.Ii. The Australian Labour politicians now in London view with a sort of dazed wonder the Government’s easy way of handling millions (says the correspondent of the "Age";. There has never been anything like it in the financial history of England. Mr Lloyd-Oeorge’s Welsh enthusiasm staggers Mr Fisher's Scottish discretion. But Mr Fisher is not censorious. He does not prelend to be in a position to make a critical survey of the position. He can only express amazement. "Just think!” lie exclaims with a gasp, "the annual expenditure of tiie country approaching £200,000,000! "Where is it going to stop?” And he reflects upon the stimulus that might be given to Australian progress if a fraction of that colossal sum could be grabbed and applied to national purposes in his own country. Mr Lloyd-George's political opponents have a sneaking admiration for the idealist in him; but they continue to regard him at a reckless spend-thrift who, in his wild anxiety to "score” and to accomplish in two or three sessions of Parliament the business of a generation, is really endangering the country by rendering it financially incapable of bearing the stress of a war or a great industrial depression. Tney say that all will go well enough with the national insurance, old ago pension and other costly measures of social amelioration until there is a disturbance of trade or until other nations get into the position of creating serious international difficulties fm- us. And it Is not the Imperialist and tariff reform party alone that expresses such fears. One of the most persistent critics of the Government nowadays is Mr H. M. Hyndman, the Socialist leader, who states that Great Britain is "floundering" in its defence policy because it is in the grip of pacifists who suffer from •‘mawkish sentiment ami contemptible pusillanimity.” and who fail to recognise & danger signal in Germany’s expenditure of £r,i>,ol l <j.<joo of borrowed money on the rapid construction of a navy disproportionate to its needs in time of peace. THE AUTOMOBILE TRADE. Probably the most remarkable expansion ever revealed by statistics relating to a particular industry in the last decade to 1909 has been disclosed by the latest figures available having reference to automobiles, A bulletin which has been published by the United States Census Bureau shows that in US99 there were in that country 57 motor car manufacturing establishments, producing 3723 machines, valued at £909.020. By 1905 the output of 100 manufactories was estimated unofficially at 2G.C01 machine.', worth i G. 930,000. At the end of 1909 the establishments turning out motors

had risen to 316, in which 127,289 cars, etc., of the aggregate value of £33.023.020 were made, in addition to parts worth £5,921,500, the value of all products being thus £38,914,520, the last total comparing with £5,504,860 in 1901, and with £949,600 in 1899. The enormous development indicated is difficult of expression in percentages, but tire census puts the increase in total output during the decade at 4.001 per cent., whilst the gain in the output of machines alone was 3.319 per cent. In the records for 1909 122,505 automobiles out of :m aggregate of 127,289 wore listed as ‘‘pleasure or family vehicles,” find 11G.494 of the motors manufactured were over .10 but less than 50 horse-power. The industry. moreover, has created a demand for special machinery and for largo quantities of steel and other furnishings. the consumption of which is having growth corresponding to its expansion.