The Timaru Herald. MONDAY, MARCH 17, 1930. WHEN IS SUMMER-TIME?

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXV, Issue 18519, 17 March 1930, Page 8

The Timaru Herald. MONDAY, MARCH 17, 1930. WHEN IS SUMMER-TIME?

An official pi’onouncement issued from tlie Prime Minister’s office oil Saturday afternoon reminded the people of New Zealand that summer-time ended in the early hours of yesterday morning. New Zealand legislators, in their wisdom or unwisdom, may claim to be able to define summer-time, and fix the statutory period between Sunday, October 13 and Sunday, March 16 as the period when “child of the sun, refulgent summer comes,” yet there is a very widely held opinion that some modification of the legislative enactment is necessary before the laws of the land can be said to have selected the period of the year in which the “air of summer is sweeter than wine.” 171111111 recent years considerable controversy lias raged round the proposal to advance the clock an hour during the months between the dates fixed by statute as summer-time. Respecting the strong protests of a large section of the community which objected to the introduction of a full measure of daylight saving, a compromise was reached which provided for the alteration of the clock by thirty minutes during the period generally recognised as New Zealand’s summer. That measure of daylight saving has been given statutory permanence, and it may be said that generally speaking the reform is accepted as a permanent provision for the people who seek added opportunities for playing games and getting into the open-air generally. But the champion of daylight saving (Sir Thomas Sidey, of Dunedin), has recently confessed that he has grave misgivings, since he has come to the conclusion that summer-time, as fixed by statute, is not summer-time at all. He suggests that changes should be made in the long-estab-lished custom of the people which fixes the summer-time vacation at the time of the year which recent experiences have shown has not brought the summer-air that is claimed by the poet to be sweeter than wine! Australia’s foremost poet, Henry Kendall, who has been described as the “Singer of the Dawn,” in his “Austral Months,” eloquently depicts the changing seasons, but he is obviously a little inaccurate in his timing, since of November he writes: “Now comes the first warm pulse of summer,” while in December “the clear summer streams” may “their sweet hosannas sing” in the heart of the poet, but not in reality! Of January, Kendall says:

The first fair month! In singing Summer’s sphere She glows, the eldest daughter of the year. All light, all warmth, all passion, breaths of myrrh, And subtle hints of rose lands, come with her. She is the warm, live month of lustre she

Makes glad the land and lulls the strong, sad sea. The highest hopes come with her. In her face Of pure, dear colour lives exalted grace; Her speech is beauty, and her radiant eyes,

Are eloquent with splendid prophesies. Recent experiences have convinced the average New Zealander, especially that very large section of the community which takes its annual vacation during the Christmas and New Year holidays, that within recent years the season has shown a definite change in the direction of a later summer. Sir Thomas Sidey has publicly asked the same question which a great number of citizens no doubt have asked each other. There was a time when of the summer we could say with Thomson:

Prom brightening fields of ether fair disclosed, Child of the sun, refulgent Summer conies.

In pride of youth, and felt through Nature’s depth; He comes, attended by the sultry hours,

And ever-fanning breezes, on his way. But now, with Sir Thomas Sidey, the people of New Zealand are beginning to ask themselves why we hold the summer vacation during that period of the year, if the poets sing in tune, which is obviously not summer, and then go back to work just as the summer is really beginning? In this district, which attracts thousands of visitors who are seeking relaxation in the blueeyed brightness of sunny South Canterbury, the question has

been seriously discussed. In the capital city where the laws of the land are enacted, it is being pointed out by the commentators who have examined Sir Thomas Sidey’s proposal, that from the beginning of December until well on toward the end of January New Zealand weather is very uncertain. Often it is quite cold, as cold, sometimes, as in winter. Yet it is in these months that we close the schools, declare annual staff vacations for grown-ups, and hire seaside cottages from which, it often happens, we rarely venture forth for bathing, boating, or fishing. The arguments for a February-March holiday season, from the weather point of vie\v are irresistible. The very triumph of the sun makes it the most tryling period of the year for

children to be shut np in schools. “Why not,” asks one "Wellington commentator, “say two

days’ holiday at Christmas, two at the New Year, and then carry on until February, when summer vacations in the real sense could be proclaimed? In fact, Sir Thomas Sidey’s suggestion comes very appropriately in a ‘summer’ that once again seems to have been set back into the autumn.” Such a proposal implies an almost revolutionary change in New Zealand's holiday-making custom, but it is obvious that the full enjoyment of annual holidays is so much dependent on the good favours of the Clerk of the Weather that the people of Nexv Zealand would welcome any reform that would fix the summer-time for New Zealand at a period of the year when “ tlie winds are full of anthems,” and “the face of heaven is filled with sunshine.”