TOPICS OF THE TIMES

Southland Times, Issue 19772, 21 February 1923, Page 4

TOPICS OF THE TIMES

All over the country on branch lines and short lines, says a writer in the Philadelphia Public Ledger, they are the time-honoured but profitless steam train with the snappy gasoline rail car. Soon it will be the usual thing to bowl along through the countryside in gas buses which run on the same rails, but have little else in common with the smoky, dirty, two-car steam train so familiar on the lesser railroads in these United States. And a mighty pleasant experience, too. These are motor buses transferred from the highway to the railway, rail limousines which carry more passengers than the touring automobile—and their trunks, as well —but treat them to similar agreeable sensations on their ride. Their windows are very large. Indeed, the entire sides of the car seem of glass; and these same big windows continue around the front of the car, and the driver is only a very minor obstruction to the | clearest of views forward. On every side ' but the rear one can see all there is to ; see—there the baggage compartment shuts i off the view. Few would have time to I wish to look back, anyway. Speed? Well, these aren’t racing cars, though at times they make 45 miles an hour. But that is too fast for the highest enjoyment, even though there is no need to worry about the follow coming from the opposite direction. At the 30 miles an hour which these gas cars have no difficulty in maintaining, and which is better than the average of the steam trains they replace, one gets from place to place quickly, sitting back the while in leisurely contemplation of the passing scene.

The difficulties with which the producers of wine in France are faced are described by an English paper. The conditions produced by the lack of markets are now such that enormous quantities of vines in the Medoc district are being pulled up by the owners of vineyards, who were disheartened by their annual loss. But this crisis is affecting not only fine claret, but all the great wines of France. The sad thing is that not only are producers losing money heavily, but that a highly-skilled industry which is peculiar to France is gradually being killed. How serious has been the loss in the champagne industry, for instance, may be seen from figures furnished by the Marquis de Polignac. Before the war • Rheims and Epemay furnished 30,000,000 bottles of champagne a year, about twothirds of which were for export. In 1920 the output was nearly 25,000,000 bottles, and in the next year this fell abruptly to 12,340,000, of which little more than half went abroad. The sale for this year is not expected to exceed that of the last, so that the sales have dropped by about two-thirds by comparison with those of pre-war times. i The reason of the crisis Is that France has ; lost about 80 per cent, of her foreign mar- , kets, while the internal consumption of fine i wines has suffered grievously from the i operation of the luxury tax. The Russian I and German markets are closed by the exi change rates, North America has gone dry, i and South America is no longer buying j much. The latest and a very heavy blow ! is being dealt to the French wine trade by ] the closing of the Turkish market, which, • according to the French Chamber of Com- ‘ merce in Constantinople, represents a value lof about 15.000,000 francs a year. Losses I like these, one blow following another in ! fairly rapid succession, have made the > French growers of fine wines look to the i future with anything but confidence.