Premier’s Birthday: Industries Fair.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 19238, 27 November 1930, Page 8

Premier’s Birthday: Industries Fair.

London Letter

(Special to the “Star.”) LONDON, October 16. ]\X R RAMSAY MACDONALD spent his sixty-fourth birthday at Chequers with his family, and Mr Scullin, the Australian Prime Minister, Mrs Scullin, Mr M’Gilligan, the Irish Free State’s chief delegate to the Imperial Conference, and Mrs M’Gilligan. They were joined at lunch by the Australian and Irish Free State delegates and their wives, who stayed for the afternoon. The Prime Minister seemed to have recovered somewhat from his trying work, and moved happily among his guests. For a time in

the afternoon they listened to the music of the wireless, of which, especially the selections from Bach, Mr MacDonald is a great admirer. During the day, the Prime Minister received i a large number of congratulatory messages. Among them was one I sent on behalf of the i public of Lossiemouth, his native place, for which he has an affec-

tionate regard. A birthday gift which he found most welcome was a few hours’ complete freedom from official claims and worries, for the last week was for him one of exceptional strain. Even those who know how much he can squeeze into a single day -were astonished by the way in which he kept pace with the day-to-day demands of last week. In addition to his nominal work at 10, Downing Street, he was able to attend all the important gatherings in connection with the Imperial Conference, preside at two meetings of the Cabinet, visit the Labour Conference at Llandudno, North Wales (travelling there and back by road), and take part in planning the arrangements necessitated by the disaster to RlOl. The burden of his official labours was all the greater by reason of the Premier's distress over the loss of his friend, Lord Thomson. The strain has told on the Prime Minister’s appearance, but it seems to have increased rather than diminished his capacity for hard work. Some of his friends have discovered in the past few days that he has immense reserves of energy, and that his powers of physical endurance are much greater than they imagined. Lord Balfour’s Memories. late Lord Balfour was within a few months of his eightieth year when he began to write the “Chapters of Autobiography,” which Cassells publish at half a guinea. Even then he wrote them reluctafttly. He had, indeed, a poor opinion of his power to recall incidents. His opinion was probably sound, for this fragment of autobiography has less than the usual proportion of personalia, and the record does not come down past 1885. Politicians will find much interest in the story of Balfour’s apprenticeship

to politics under the great Marquis of Salisbury, full as it is of the uncle’s comments on his contemporaries Disraeli, Lord Derby, Gladstone. They will be especially interested in Balfour’s story of the “Fourth Party” and his judgment on Lord Ra n d ol p h Churchill’s attempt to (and capture) the party organisation. Not less valuable is the

story, as told by Balfour, of Mr Gladstone’s political orientation between June, 1885 and June, 1886. Perhaps the most interesting of all, is the account of the consummation of the Home Rule split. These “episodes” are described in detail, their documentation speeches, notes made at the time, frequent letters to Lord Salisbury and others. They will be found indispensable as a complement to accounts from other sides—Mr Winston Churchill’s “Life of Lord Randolph,” Lord Gladstone’s “After Thirty Years,” the “Life of Devonshire,” and Mr Harold Gorst’s “Fourth Party.” Not less valuable are the judgments on contemporaries—as searching as they are tolerant. Lord Balfour was a man with few prejudices and no illusions. But if he appreciated the honesty of Gladstone’s conversion to Home Rule, he disliked Gladstone’s tactics in concealing his conversion till the General Election was over—his policy of “silence and delay.” He wrote: “Such reticence may easily from Mr Gladstone’s view have seemed capable of defence. Among the courses open to him he doubtless thought that this was the one least open to objection. But were I hunting for words that would most fittingly describe it, I have to own that ‘square and honest’ are certainly not those that would first occur to me.” The Next Industries Fair. 'J'WO new sections are being formed for the London section of the British Industries Fair in February. One is for printing machinery, a branch of industry hitherto represented by only one or two exhibits with the Stationery and Allied Trades Section. Some 5000 square feet of space will be used for exhibits of offset, photogravure and other presses, type-casting and composing machines and folding machines. The other new section is being arranged by the British Plastic Moulding Trade Association, a newly-formed association representing an industry which has expanded rapidly during the last three or four years. In the stationery section, irrespective of printing machinery, space booked already amounts to some 20,000 square feet, an increase compared with last February, accounted for partly by increased demands of former exhibitors and partly by applications from new-comers. The fancy goods section will also be much larger than that of last year’s Fair. Among the ninety firms who have taken space, lamp shade manufacturers are strongly represented. New exhibitors in the food section at Olympia will be the leading metal-box printers and canners. The largest co-operative exhibit will be that of the British Optical Instrument Manufacturers’ Association, for which 3500 squtare feet has been reserved. This association exhibited for the first time last February, and the new plans are the outcome cf the success of that experiment. Other exhibits not seen before in the London section will be coinoperated vending machines, previously included in the schedule for the Birmingham section of the Fair. Helium For Airships. JN consequence of the destruction by fire of RlOl, it is being urged in some quarters that RIOO should not be allowed to come from her shed again filled with hydrogen, if there is any possible means of procuring enough helium for her. The idea of using helium as a filling for airships was first put forward in 1914 by Sir Richard Thretfall to the Board of Inventions of the Admiralty, and this was followed by investigations with the principal source of helium in the British Empire—the natural gas deposits of Canada. But it is thought that the available Canadian supplies are totally inadequate; the wells are at Inglewood, near Toronto, and were located in 1925. In America, however, the situation is quite different, and it is hoped that she will listen to the suggestion of Dr Eckener, the German airship expert, and lift her embargo on the export of helium. America has vast resources of natural gas, particularly in Texas and Kansas, and, though the proportion of helium is seldom more than point five or point six per cent, its economical separation ha£ been very well developed. America has a good deal more helium than she needs. Though not inflammable, and not so explosive, helium gives considerably less lift than hydrogen, and would be much more expensive, volume by volue, especially with the added cost of transport.