VISCOUNT HALDANE.

Wanganui Herald, Volume XXXXVI, Issue 13336, 27 March 1911, Page 4

VISCOUNT HALDANE.

The elevation of the Hon. It. B. Haldane, Minister of War, to a visconntey, is doubt less due to the fact that a strong mind is required to load the House of Lords, owing to the illness of the Karl of Crewe, and Viscount. Haldane possesses the necessary qualifications for the position. He is now 5b years of ago, and lias been in Parliament since 1885. representing Haddingtonshire, occupying the position of Secretary of State for War since 1905. He is a. hard-thinking, never-tiring individual, with a prodigoua power of work. What is more, he is a, man of ideas, with the extra quality of urbanity of manner thrown in ; and has done much to evolve order out of chaos in the administration of such an intricate department as that of War, the territorial scheme, of which so much has been said on both sides, being his “magnum opus." Mr Haldane has been called “Tim Brain of the Empire,” and no doubt ho is an eminently practical man.' He began as “devil" to Sir - Horace Davey; and subsequently built up a lucrative practice of his own in the highest courts.’ Ho has the gift of “getting things done,” and, further, of persuading pec pie to support his ideas. His attitude—narked up by speeches and writings—on educational matters shows that he has seized the connection between education and national efficiency. He has a thorough grasp of scientific problems. He formulated a scheme for the reform of the House of Lords as a Supreme Imperial Tribunal, and ho has written many papers and delivered many speeches on Imperial organisation, lie works all day and all night, and is an authority on everything. Although, like. Mr Chamberlain, he is not devoted to physical exercise, ho enjoys the best of health. He understands the maxim thoroughly: “The way to get things done is not to mind who gets the credit for doing them.” He maybe termed an underground worker —a maker of the bullets which others fire. Of him an English journal once remarked: “Rotund, precise, and miraculously informed, his quick stride through the lobby indicates his quick progress through life. Work is his recreation, and philosophic enquiry his diversion. After the famous longdistance run on the Army Annual Bill, when he was in his place for nearly 30 hours, subsisting on a few hard-boiled eggs and a basin of soup, he sprinted to Ins private room to dispose of the day’s correspondence. Has an alert pair of eyes, critically pursed lips, and wears clothes which' always seem too tight. Has the power of deflecting criticism; seems to persuade the views of other people rather than to control them; and steers the House after the manner of an ingenious big brother—as witness his celebrated reference to “strawberries and other jambearing plants” when the Labour men were becoming angry about the Land Tenure Bill. An industrious and subtle lawyer, and a famous amateur in the cobwebby intellectualities of Germany, lie has contrived to persuade all the general officers and all the military critics that his scheme of Army reform is right. He passed the Territorial Army Bill—establishing what humorists call the Terriers—while nobody was looking.' That is the characteristic of the man. Humankind is a conglomeration of persons, not to be, driven, but beguiled, along the path which; is best for them.” Mr Haldane is the author of “The Life of Adam Sinith," “Education and Empire,” aiid .“The” Pathtfhy to Reality.” •■'■n'