PUBLIC OPINION.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17831, 27 April 1926, Page 8

PUBLIC OPINION.

WHAT OTHER WRITERS ARE SAYING. ON THE TOBOGGAN. From ninepence the franc has dropped to a little less than a half-penny in value, a feeling akin to panic having yesterday assisted the toboggan slide of the currency to as low as 147 francs to the pound. The fall has followed the law of gravity, increasing in pace as the depth increases. Unless some form of stabilisation be effected it is difficult to see how the franc is to keep out of the company of the paper marie in the rubbish-heap of finance. The Budget, it was hoped, would arrest the decline; it is haying the opposite effect. An attempt to attribute the landslide to American machination is not justified. Rehabilitation must come from nearer home than that. The French people are prosperous, if the nation is bankrupt, and only from inside caxi a return to normality be secured, and that return involves the Frenchman, capitalist and worker alike, shouldering the burden as it was shouldered in England, and facing the necessity for sacrifice in peace as well as war. The return to parity was not achieved by the budgetary su'bterfugcs and: hesitations adopted by France. Taxation need not be paralysing; it could be u*ade much heavier that it is without any injury to the sqcial fabric, and, while restoring the credit of France abroad, work a reformation at home which would ver>- quickly compensate for the temporary sacrifices involved.—“ The Star,’’ Auckland. AMUSINGLY AT CROSS PURPOSES. Really, Mr Grounds and Mr Wright, the Dairy Control Board's chief representative in London, ought to keep in closer' touch. If they did, they would avoid contradicting each other over 12,000 miles of blue water. Mr Grounds has practically assured the producers that Mr Wright’s system of selling will enable them to secure the same price, as the Danes receive—or somewhere near it. The board’s chairman has put it on record that, although there is no difference in the quality, Dnaish butter averages nearly 3d a lb more than New Zealand butter. That extra threepence can come only from the British consumer. The impost will not tend to make that already harassed person any the more favourably disposed toward New Zealand or its butter. But Air Wright, at the London end, indignantly repudiates the suggestion that he intends to extract the last penny from the British consumer. Yet a greater than Mr Wright has in effect promised the farmers that absolute control will bring them another threepence a lb. It will be Mr Wright’s duty always to keep that object in front of his mind. He may call it stabilising prices; we should give it another and less cheerful name. If Mr Wright is not where and what he is for the express purpose' of collaborating with the agents from day to day and fix selling prices, what is he doing over there? It would save a lot of explanation and misunderstanding if Mr Grounds, Mr Wright, and the editor of the “Exporter”—the journal heavily subsidised by the Dairy Control Board—would only consult one another before breaking into print.—“ The Times.” Wellington. PATHETIC! There is something pathetic, but not unprecedented, in the death of Professor Lefrov's secrets with himself. It will be remembered that he lost his life in his laboratory from a certain gas which he was preparing for the destruction of insect pests. What that gas was may never be known, but it was potent enough to compass the death of its compounder. He set nothing down in writing, it is said, but kept mental notes of what he did and the results- he obtained. All that he left behind him was a collection of mixed chemicals, out of which, it seems, nothing of practical value can be gleaned. He became but one more in the long line of martyrs to science, with this difference: that the fruits of his latest researches disappeared with him. So, too, have many secrets in the arts and sciences passed beyond recovery. In vain have certain pigments in painting and in decoration of pottery used by ancient artists been sought in these days. But their secrets died with them. Close approximations may be obtained, but the real thing has been lost for ever. Still, the sum of knowledge is vast and ever growing, and what Professor Lefroy lost his life in achieving may yet be accomplished by other means.—“ Post," Wellington. EXPORT or APPLES. After several days of indecision the apple-growers of the Dominion have been given an assurance that adequate shipping space will be available to take the exportable surplus of their produce. This relieves a situation that threatened to dash severely the hopes they had built on the foundation of an exceptionally bountiful crop. So far, it is satisfactory, but it still fails to explain away the development of the situation. The secretary of the Fruit Control Board has made a statement covering those districts in which that body operates. The core of it is that the crop has been of such size, and so free from disease, that those with a lifetime’s experience of fruit-growing could not foresee how much would be available for export. It would lie more convincing if it did not describe just the circumstances the board is supposed to foresee and provide against. The crop may be a great one, but apples do not appear or mature in a night like mushrooms. Surely with close organisation and good staff work the board could have known before the fruit was streaming into the. stores that its first estimates were wide of the mark. —“ Herald,” Auckland.