WHAT CORRESPONDENTS SAY.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18805, 6 July 1929, Page 4

WHAT CORRESPONDENTS SAY.

NOT AN AURORA. To the Editor. Dear Sir, —Re the letter in your correspondence columns this evening headed, “ Was it an Aurora?” I may inform “ Observant ” that the lighting up of fog and cloud at 6 a.m. was caused by the pole of the electric locomotive of the Lyttelton train coming in contact with the ice-encrusted cable. From Cashmere Hills it made a very fine sight.—l am, etc., G. W. PLIMSOLL. PLUMMER OR PLIMMER. To the Editor. Dear Sir,—ln reference to the old group of Christy Minstrels published in the “ Star,” a correspondent says that one of them was named Plimmer. in fact, that Mr John Plimmer was clerk in H.M. Customs. I am not certain, but believe he was a son of Mr Plimmer, the Father of Wellington. George Plummer left the waterman’s business and took the position as caretaker at the immigration barracks on Ripa Island. From there he went into the hotel business in Christchurch. Mr William Hillier was never in H.M. Customs. —I am, etc., A VERY ANCIENT MARINER. UNEMPLOYMENT. To the Editor. Dear Sir, —Kindly allow me a little space in your paper to voice my opinion on the remedy of unemployment. I say “ Hear, hear,” to “ One Toiler.” I have been waiting to see if someone would suggest something like his sentiments. I think everyone in constant work, man or woman, and even apprentices, could give a little, say, twopence or threepence in the pound. I think there are very few who would begrudge a little for the benefit of their fellow-men, but it would have to be compulsory, not to provide charity, but to provide a fund for the benefit of the city that would give the men employment, this would not only benefit the workless but also the business people. It is time something was done to remedy this dreadful state of affairs. I think Mr Neale is quite right when he said charity begins at home.—l am, WORK, NOT CHARITY. GIVE THE BOYS FOOTBALL. To the Editor. Dear Sir, —I can only express my sincerest admiration for your correspondent “Amazed.” This is my first year in New Zealand, but I am not unversed in the ways of competition procedure, and to me it seems preposterous that tables should be so disarranged by postponement of fixtures. This is my first experience of the Col-lege-School match, and as a sportsman in the truest sense I can honestly say that if my boys had benefited by it, it would have bad my approbation; but as it was. they would have been better playing their own games. Conditions were ideal for football, but the day was dulled by the mediocrity of the play No brilliant rushes and snappy interludes gladdened the eye, such as one might expect from the premier secondary schools of Christchurch, but instead a game that | was only comparable with one of a lower grade. Sir, I object to my boys being deprived of their football.—l am, etc., FATHER OF FIVE. THEOLOGY AND ’QUAKES. To the Editor. * Dear Sir,—Could you grant me space and indulgence to comment on the extraordinary letter signed “ 11. H. Bruhn,” who, while he says, “ God is His own interpreter,” sets out to interpret the recent earthquake disaster as the will of the Deity. Never, except in the voo-doo devil worship of some savage negro race, could one conjure up such a malignant monster as Mr Bruhn presents to us, as the cause of all the recent destruction, although it is said man makes his God in his own image. The only similar expression of views I can recall was that when the s.s. Penguin shipwieck desolated over a hundred homes a local religious body passed a resolution relating to it, and concluded with the smug perspicuity that they could see the finger of God in the disaster. Despite Mr Bruhn’s sneer at evolution (of which Bishop Cherrington has just said one might as well declaim against the law of gravitation or the circulaton of the blood) there is more comfort in a rational geological explanation of the earthquake than Mr Bruhn’s fantastic demon, which explains nothing. Professor Haeckel, the greatest scientist who ever lived, said superstition was the greatest enemy of the human race, and Mr Bruhn’s dreadful supernaturalism is both retrograde and repulsive enough to be included in that damning indictment.—l am, etc., YOKEL. TO PUZZLED FATHER. To the Editor. Dear Sir, —I am sorry to notice that both “ Puzzled Father ” and “ Doubtful ” prefer to remain in the position of unbelief and doubt. Had they acted like the Bereans, spoken of by Paul in his days, they would have “ searched the Scriptures ” and possibly found as they did “ that these things were so.” Acts 17:10-12. lam afraid the dilemma of “ Puzzled Father ” will now be greatly increased by the news from the Island of Ambrym, New Hebrides, that a volcano has destroyed the mission stations there. Can his ministerial brethren expiain why it is that God should destroy Ilis own missions, when with wickedness so rampant throughout the world, any other place but a mission station could have been destroyed ? I know of a religious denomination who state that if a child is left to them till eight years of age, anyone can have the child after that, so evidently this age is a very impressive and retentive one. I would have been pleased to have the opportunity of explaining the point at issue to his eight-year-old son and am confident as to its result, hence the offer of my address. Isaiah teaches in Ch. 28:9-13, that to “ teach knowledge, precept must be upon precept., line upon line, here a little, there a little.” This I endeavoured to do, but your correspondents failed to see this point and so missed the light that otherwise may have been theirs. “ Doubtful ” infers that I wrote in anger. No such thing was in my mind. I leave that to the originator of same, viz., Satan. If Bible texts are assertions and not facts then I certainly have nothing better to offer, and so like Balaam's poor old ass that saw the “ safety light,” I prefer to accept the same and not follow Balaam, who came to such an ignoble end. Apologising lor trespassing again upon vour valuable space and thanking you.—l am, etc., A.M.C.

SOCCER COMPLAINT. To the Editor. Dear Sir,—lt is about time that we had some one at the head of the affairs of the C.F.A., who will give fair play to all teams, and not give all the jewels to one team which has the luck to have the best players in Canterbury. Kaiapoi has been drawn to play Thistle on Saturday, at English Park. These matches are supposed to be drawn for home and away. Kaiapoi played away last Saturday, and their next match should have been at home, and, according to the first round, Kaiapoi should have been drawn against Rangers at home. Seeing that Kaiapoi only played Thistle three weeks ago, why are they drawn against Thistle on Saturday? It is not fair play to ask the players to travel two Saturdays running. To play one match at home and one away costs the players 30s each travelling expenses, which is a fair amount these hard times, without trying to make it more. Two years ago the C.F.A. drove Kaiapoi out of the competition through playing them six matches away from home in succession. It looks as if the same thing is going to happen this season. Sumner is in the same boat. They have played about six matches in succession away from home. Why should the suburban teams tolerate this? How is it that we can be told who we are going to play a week before the draw is supposed to take place? It gives one the impression that the draw is faked. It wants a Match Committee that will show no favours, and treat every team the same. We can’t be all crackerjacks. —I am, etc., FAIR PLAY. BILL WOULD GIVE CITY RESERVE TO SOCIETY. To the Editor. Dear Sir, —I am sure all true lovers of our city will appreciate your leader and your correspondents’ letters, and view with very sincere regret the decision of our City Council to endeavour to get a Bill through Parliament enabling the council to give away the public reserve on which the old fire station now stands. I have examined the draft Bill, which lies for inspection at the Magistrate’s Court, and am amazed at the free and easy way the document acknowledges the trust imposed on the council by the Christchurch Reserves Act of 1877, guarding this reserve Power is sought to grant a free title of the reserve to the Plunket Society so that in the event of the Government or hospital authorities taking over the work of the Plunket Society, this public reserve could be for auction with the council itself bidding in competition with the speculator On many occasions during the past seven years letters have been sent to the council asking for the removal of the old eye-sore that these buildings are, and assurance has been given that the council would honour their bond—later on Several times I have been urged to apply to the Supreme Court for a Writ of Mandamus to compel the council to clear away the buildings without delay. Had this good advice been followed, we should not now be faced with the danger of a Parliamentary Bill legalising a steal of a public reserve. There are at least a dozen other places equally central and more suitable for the Plunket Society than these tumble-down rat-infested barracks. Bellamy’s, as mentioned by your two other correspondents, being an ideal place. This building and lawn in front of it, were a gift to the provinces ot Canterbury and Westland by the Coates Government. This will be available shortly, and for what better purposes could this building be used than those of the Plunket Society’? That there will be strong opposition to the Bill goes without saying: the giving away of open spaces in the heart of a growing industrial city is unthinkable.—l am, etc., R. B. OWEN. EARTHQUAKES NOTHING TO BOMBARDMENTS. To tbe Editor. Dear Sir, —I have noticed a few letters in your columns re the earthquakes. I do not intend to join in any religious argument on the matter, but would just like to point out that these shocks may illustrate to the otherwise ignorant “ civvy ” what thousands of soldiers had to endure for weeks and months sometimes at a stretch, under the fearful bombardments in France. I remember so well being on a signal station in the front line at Armentieres for about twelve days at one stretch Every day, for at least one hour in the tw’enty-four, the Germans opened out, and threw everything over they could lay hands on. The trench, with the exception of the signal dug-out, was ripped and .smashed to smithereens more than a score of times. How that escaped is always a mystery to me; but I do know’ that the “ elephant iron ” above me sprang and twisted, shook and shivered like a piece of elastic the whole time, while the ground rolled, opened a thousand times beneath me. and then each time closed again with the shuddciing shock of a fearful earthquake. Again, when at River Post, and again in the Somme, I experienced the same thing. But the worst effect, I think, was when the “ strafe ” lifted. The terrible reaction upon ons’s nerves was enough to make one a raving maniac. And that, sir, is just the effect of the whole war upon thousands of returned men to-day. Yet I know there are plenty of people who can make game of us. They laugh at us because we are eccentric; they sneer and jeer behind our backs; they encourage the younger generation to poke fun at the “ half-way ” cases at Hanmer. They are never happy unless they arc telling children, in disparaging tones, that a “ nervy ” soldier is never to be trusted, the result i being, of course, that these people decrease the chances of recovery by about 100 per cen J Perhaps the earthquakes will teach them something of what we had to endure for their sakes, and something of the fearful cost we have paid in order to “ make the world safe for democracy," a cost for which there never can be any compensation, because, as it has been written, so it is. And. after all, the only thing we ask is just a little human recognition, and not merely a tombstone when at length the Last Post rings out across the Styx.—l am, etc., R. M. THOMSON. 12. Scotia Place, Auckland, Julv 4. 1929. A THRUSH AT DAWN. To the Editor. Dear Sir; —I have been obliged to lay aside my pen for a while, but. if it is not too late, I would like to thank two of your correspondents, “Aunt Mary" and “CM.,” for their cheery letters in answer to mine entitled “Happiness anti Song." First of all, I owe “Aunt Mary" (practical Aunty Mary, who thinks of throstle’s

breakfast as the cause of his joyou song), an apology, for in putting m; \Vest End address beneath a latte that I wrote from my tiny bedroom in the East End. I misled “Aunt Muy' into thinking I had inveigled her Joe:away from the old cabbage tree to Fer. dalton via Hereford Street. No! it wa. "Aunt Mary's" Joey all right. that I heard as he sat on the windmill, near the cabbage tree in the East End, and he did not drag me out oi bed 31 dawn. for I wrote the letter in bed: so "Aunt Mary" and I. without cw: having met or having been introduced had been most scandalously listening simultaneously to the same [endured songster. Now, Joey, please. when you sing to “Aunt Mary" again. just ask her tc tune in to your wave-length sufiidem 1y to catch the real itnport of youl song, because you and I both kno“ that worms have nothim to do with it Fish love worms. but they don‘t sing ‘ after a meal. Anyway. I am sure “Aunt Mary" and “CM." are both , delightful people. and cheery optimists, or they would not love the thrush as ‘ they do. I have a special love for the thrush because I have been gladdened by hi; song in England, the Isle of Wight. ' Jersey, France. Belgium. Holland, Ausj tralia, and now here in sunny New ‘ Zealand. I hope New Zealnndera will never rage the thrush—l am etc.. \V. LESTER CROSS East End.