CURRENT LONDON TOPICS

Taranaki Daily News, 28 December 1934, Page 13

CURRENT LONDON TOPICS

ORDERS FROM RUSSIA EFFECT OF MANCHUKUO DISPUTE. FRIENDLINESS OF JAPANESE. (Special Correspondent). London, Sept. 13. It’s an ill wind that blows nobody any good, and the cyclonic disturbances set up between Japan and Russia over Manchukuo appear to be carrying a certain amount of balm to our shores. Certainly Japan of recent days has shown herself much more desirous of accommodating her trade rivalries with British industries. British visitors to Japan, moreover, ail speak of the friendly reception accorded them, which they say is reminiscent of the old days of the Alliance. On the other hand, the Soviet, which presumably is dis-' turbed by the prospect of renewed Anglo-Japanese understanding, is attempting to propitiate us by becoming a better customer. Reports from Russia indicate that the Foreign Departs ment is already revising its distribution of foreign trade, with a view to placing substantial orders in England.

Food Controller. The death of Lord Devonport recalls wartime memories with a vengeancetimes when we had pork and beans for dinner on Sunday, and sometimes less nourishing for the rest of the week, and when a dish of poached eggs set in a bed of spinach was considered something of a luxury. For Lord Devonport was Food Controller during the difficult years of 1916-17 when the submarine menace was at its height and food supplies in this country were reduced sometimes to a dangerous level. I attended many of the periodical conferences which Lord Devonport had with the Press in those days to explain exactly how things stood, and how many days we could carry on if food supplies were stopped. Like many other of the mushroom Ministries of the war, the Food Controller was established in one of the great ducal residences of West End. Walking up the great staircase shrouded then in dust-sheets, you were faced at the top by “The Blue Boy,” one of the most famous paintings in the world.

Flags of Remembrance. When the Duke of Gloucester attends the formal dedication ceremony of the war memorial at Melbourne on Armistice Day next, he will have memories of one of the services he attended a few years ago at the Cenotaph in Whitehall. One of the flags to be flown at the Melbourne service will be one which was first unfurled at the Cenotaph at a service he attended. These flags do service for 12 months, when they are replaced by new flags, the old ones being preserved by one or other of the public museums. The : Imperial War Museum at Kensington has a number of them, and has given one to the Victoria National War Museum at Melbourne. This is the one to be used in the service oh Armistice Day. Many requests, prompted by a desire to make commercial profit, have been made for the old flags, but they have been consistently declined—with thanks.

Droitwich Calling. Newspaper reporters can be pretty quick sometimes, but it was no use their hoping to get away with any scoops about the opening of the B.B.C’s new transmitting station at Droitwich. The thing simply opened itself, and the whole world must have known all about it before the smartest shoidhand writer could have got down “Jack Robinson." The 8.8. C. were most considerate in providing the Pressmen with a special train between Droitwich and London and a very special luncheon, but they really might have spared themselves the trouble. Long before that express could rush Its way back to town the new national transmitters, in no uncertain voice, had proved of what they are capable to every corner of the British Empire. The Press has cause to thank its hosts for a most agreeable day’s outing, and will for once feel no resentment in being left “behind the bus.” Sir Henry Wood’s Hoax.

Sir Henry Wood, whose musical hoax is the amused talk of artistic circles—he transcribed one of Bach’s organ works for the orchestra under ,the name of Paul Klenovsky—is noted for his cosmopolitan outlook and catholicity of taste. Not only is he one of our greatest conductors, but a painter of merit. It must be only his innate modesty that prevents him from arranging a “oneman” show of his work, unless, of course, he holds the view that no man can show virtuosity in two separate forms of art. Sir Henry Wood has made music so much part of his life that it takes precedence over almost everything else, including, if necessary, his sleep and his meals. He is also very human about his music. He knows, for example, that at the enf of the promenade concerts season the audiences like nothing better than to join in the singing of the National Anthem. So he turns round and conducts their singing. Early Theatres. The Westminster Theatre’s experiment of advertising an early performance on Wednesdays is one of the results which will be watched with interest by the managements of many other London playhouses. The innovation is, of course, especially intended to interest the great army of city workers, 20,000 of whom have been circularised with the news of these 6.15 p.m. shows. The present hours of evening and matinee performances certainly are unsuited to the convenience of office workers, who mostly live some considerable distance away in the suburbs, and who are consequently reluctant to sacrifice their hours of sleep to amusement. The theatre which starts at a quarterpast six, however, will allo.w them ample time for a light meal after office hours and will still leave them with a margin in which to get home in respectable bedtime. That Monster. When the Loch Ness monster made its sensational debut, the opinion of an old sea captain was quoted. That opinion was that the monster is a seal, or perhaps a number of them, which would give an impression, when they swam on the surface of the water in procession as seals will, of some monstrous snakelike animal cutting across the Ness. Local views scornfully rejected this hypothesis, partly perhaps because mortal men love to believe the incredible if possible, but partly also because the monster was a first-class business proposition from the visitor-book point of view, which is the same as that of the box office in the theatrical world. But now the films taken at Loch Ness of the monster’s manifestations have been scrutinised by a score of Zoo and Museum experts. The verdict is unanimous. The monster is a grey seal. So the story about its carrying off a sheep is sheer folk lore. Life in Kenya. Almost I am persuaded to pack up and book single fare for Nairobi. A young friend, who recently took up a ■6lO-a-week jot out there, assures me he

is living on what would at home be a £lOOO-a-year scale, and saving money. “I have a Really first-class valet,” he writes, “a good cook, two waiters, and a, chamber-boy, which with food and quarters costs about £7 a month. Golf costs 30s a month, tennis 20s and Nairobi Club 20s. Drink is exactly the same price as at home, and cigarettes and tobacco much cheaper. So I can easily run a car and have a bit over for entertaining. What I really miss here is the walking. Even on the outskirts of Nairobi it is unsafe to walk at night owing to lions and leopards. The former are perfect gentlemen, and would not intentionally hurt anyone unless frightened, but the leopards are perfect fiends. And there is always the odd chance of a ‘broke’ native with a knobkerrie.” Bombs for Bill. The burglary epidemic is producing the inevitable crop of quack remedies. Some of the quacks, however, are prodigiously loud ones. I saw a demonstration of one patent device that ought to make burglaries a popular feature with week-end house parties. It is a wooden missile, about the size and shape of an orange, which on being thrown explodes with a bang and flash that recall our old friends the Mills bombs, though the effects are far less devastating. If the burglar happens to be an ex-service-man, and to have served with the bombers, it will make him fancy he is back with the jolly old suicide club again. Snow-balling Bill Sykes with these burglar bombs should be great sport for our Bright Young Things on long winter nights. It would be bound to disconcert the burglar, and might even scare the cat out of a moiety of its lives, but I cannot say how it would affect the ceilings. ANOTHER YOUNG ASQUITH EXCEPTIONALLY BRILLIANT. OXFORD COLLEGE ENTERED. (Special Correspondent.) London, Oct. 18. The young Earl of Oxford and Asquith began his university career last week. It seems but a year or two since the large circle of his father’s acquain-

tance were mourning that father’s death in the war and commiserating with the tiny boy bereaved by it. But his prep, school days at Worthing have passed, and his years at Downside, and now he has entered Balliol, his father’s old college at Oxford. Little has been heard of him, for his mother has wisely kept him out «f any suggestion of limelight, but he has the reputation of being exceptionally brilliant, and may cause as great a stir at Oxford as did Raymond Asquith. Already he has shown an interest in politics, and has listened to debates in both the House of Commons and the House of Lords. He has travelled much ' more than the average young man of eighteen, and his wide reading and comprehensive studies can be detected in his rather shy conversation. Back Again. Mr. Hughes’ return to active public life, with a seat in the new Australian Cabinet, is a fact worth nothing. Mr. Hughes will at least introduce personality and punch into the Ministerial coterie. He was one of the big figures at Versailles after the soldiers handed over to the frocks, as Sir Henry Wilson rather spitefully called the statesmen, and completely won the heart of old Clemenceau. His deafness, which necessitated the use of an elaborate patent mechanism, only emphasised the pungency of the then Australian Premier’s blunt comments on men and things. Clemenceau loved him for his “aboriginality,” or lack of diplomatic finesse in stating his views, i Once Clemenceau asked him whether his compatriots were cannibals. When Mr. Hughes finally caught the query, through his apparatus, he replied, with a perfect poker face: “Not all of them!” His Father. The young Duke of Norfolk, who takes Imperial politics seriously, is going to determine for himself the rights and wrongs of the Indian controversy. At the end of this month he is off to India on a tour of personal investigation on the spot. He has not done a great deal of travel hitherto, the army having claimed most of his time since he reached his majority. A London paper states that his father, the little sturdy blackbearded duke, was making a South African tour when the Boer War broke out. This is not so. The duke was Lord Salisbury’s Postmaster-General,

and staggered the head of the Cecils by suddenly intimating, at a persons interview, that he intended to resign his post and join up for the Boer War. Persuasion could not alter this determination, and off the duke went as an Imperial Yeoman. A little later two other Ministers called on Lord Salisbury, one being the aged Lord Cross. “Don’t tell me,” exclaimed the disgruntled Prime Minister, looking at Lord Cross, “that you are resigning, too, in order to join the army! No. 10. Mr. Ramsay MacDonald’s decision to n ake his Hampstead house his home, and 10 Downing Street merely his. office, does not astonish his friends. Even Chequers no longer lures the Prime Minister for week-ends as it formerly did, before he was established in his Hampstbad retreat. No. 10, perhaps the most famous house in the world, is a bit of a white elephant. Only a Prime Minister can run it properly who is willing and able to draw heavily on his own private purse. There are no fewer than 60 rooms. The house is divided into two parts, the Government bearing the cost of lighting, heating, and cleaning those, rooms on tho ground floor which are used for office or Cabinet work. The rest of the house has to be run out of the official occupant’s own income, and until gas cookers were recently installed, the domestic coal bill took more than half the Prime Minister’s State salary. But, in addition to all this, Mr. MacDonald finds his Hampstead home far more congenial both to himself and his family. South African Passengers. Seeing a friend off to South Africa last week, I was told that the steamers running to Cape Town are at present filled to overflowing. That is due partly to the return of holidaymakers, who have been spending the summer in this country, and partly to the fact that the Union is at present the most' prosperous part of thqJbwtish Empire. The rise in the price ofgold has affected not merely that industry,. but the whole trade of the Dominion. lam told that on the South. liners accommodation is in great demand during the next few weeks.