Topics of the Week.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXV, Issue X, 8 September 1900, Page 434

Topics of the W eek.

Are We Becoming More Luxurious?

The general opinion of those who are not connected with journalism is that the writing of Buch notes as these is the easiest thing under the sun. “Pens and paper are provided for you,” it is argued. “What have you got to do but to set to work?” That there should be any difficulty in the selection of a subject, and the method of its treatment, never occurs to the lay mind, while the very usual state of mind when it seems utterly impossible to write a line about anything in the wide world, is utterly incomprehensible to those outside the profession. Of course the thing has to be done, it is done, but with what effort and at, what pains only those who have been through the scribbler’s mill know. One of the obstacles which modern methods have placed in the path of the journalist of to-day is that the public are so infinitely suspicious of puff or advertisement in disguise, that many subjects which afford ample material for more or less interesting treatment have to be abandoned for fear they could be contorted into an advertisement for someone or other. Eor instance, a new experiment to be tried in one of our New Zealand cities opens up a couple of subjects which afford scope for certain reflections. A large restaurant is to be opened at which meals are to be served of a higher and more expensive class than has been the custom heretofore, and where special attention is to be given to the providing of dinner parties on a scale of luxury to which only certain clubs and great hotels of the largest colonial cities have up to now aspired, if the name of the city were mentioned this would infallibly be considered a bare-faced puff. Yet the fact that money is ,to be lavished on such an experiment at once raises three questions worth discussing—first, as to whether a taste for luxury in the matter of eating and drinking is growing amongst the present and the rising generation; second, whether it is more or less confined to one set or class; and third, whether the tendency (if it exists) is a subject for congratulation or the reverse. Query number one may, I think, be answered at once in the affirmative. The enormous increase in the number of restaurants, tea rooms,- etc., during the past five or six years must have struck the least observant. Eleven years ago, when the writer first came to the colony, it was the almost universal practice for men—especially young men—to bring down their own lunch, and the eating houses, whose moderate charges were, and continue, a never ending marvel to one brought up to English prices—were chiefly used by the principals and senior clerks. The tea rooms, and what one might term the “restauranettes,” which are now crowded at every luncheon hour, were then non-existent. That there should have been a revolt against the home-made luncheon was inevitable. Only a community which could not for financial reasons help itself would tolerate the home-cut, home-put-together luncheon. Even when done by a skilled and cunning housewife —one with a delicate hand and sympathetic mi nd —the home lunch was only a success on tolerance. But when, as was the case with the vast majority, it was done in haste, and at the last moment by the servant—l crave pardon, house assistant—at the boarding-house, the home-cut lunch was—well, you probably remember. Pah! the very recollection raises one’s gorge. But not only has the present and rising generation revolted against! this—it has insisted on the rapid improvement of the places where the more agreeable substitute is provided. Look back over the last three or four years. Has not there been an enormous improvement in the daintiness with which food is served, and the manner with which it is cooked? Quantity has given place to quality in many cases, and competition and supply and demand have proved that there is willingness everywhere to sacrifice quantity for quality. “Little and good” is now the motto. “Rough but plenty of it” seems to be rapidly dying out. Hitherto no effort has been made to go above one shilling per meal at the majority of res-

taurants. Now we are to see whether colonials are willing to spend more, or whether “the best you can do up to a shilling” is the demand of the public. Personally, I am inclined to think it may be. On another point: It is often stated that the love of eating, or rather the thought of what shall be eaten and what shall be drunk, is purely or almost purely masculine. “Women do not care,” we are told. Observation leads one to believe that in this as in other things New Zealand is the Antipodes of the Old World. The patronage of the new class of restaurant and tea room, and the amount expended on dainty feeding by women is amazing. Moreover, afternoon teas and at homes, where the fare provided was once cakes, toast, and bread and butter, have now developed into excuses for what schoolboys expressively term “a spread.” Trifles, fruit salad, and even more solid viands, are now universal at such entertainments. And tea—well, it ’tis said there are substitutes for tea too. That the taste for increased luxury and a greater expenditure on food is not confined to the moneyed class fs, I think, admitted. Here, as in England, the artizan is decidedly fond of his dinner—more especially his Sunday dinner —and here as in England the amount of poultry consumed by the “working man” in comparison with that by the middle class mercantile man is astonishing. The Saturday night sales, both in quantity and price, at the fruit and poultry shops exceed those of the entire week, and the purchasers are almost wholly of the class who have arrogated to themselves the title of “working men.” Finally, is the growing taste for greater luxury in living to be deplored? In strict moderation I think not. Plain living and high thinking is no doubt the ideal mode of existence. But while human nature is human nature it will remain more or less ideal. If taste for better things in a material is growing, so is taste in aesthetic and spiritual matters also, and so long as the former does not outrun the latter we shall do very fairly. O O O O O

State Interference.

The extinction of the trading stamp will grieve no one but the individuals who made a very comfortable living therefrom. The system was altogether admirable from the point of view of the Trading Stamp Company, but from every other standpoint it was undesirable, helping neither purchaser nor retailer, but taxing both for the benefit of a middle party, who did nothing for his money. The only argument it was possible to urge in favour of trading stamps has been met by the new Bill, small discounts can be given, but they will be in cash or the equivalent of cash, and not an object which might or might not be worth the value claimed for it by a company, though never so benevolently inclined. The course taken up by the Government in this matter is another and rather good instance of the right claimed and exercised by modern government to interfere between the individual and the public, if they think the public are being in any way not perhaps altogether victimised, but over-charged, or made to suffer for the advancement of the unit. There are a considerable number of gentlemen now earning large, or at all events comfortable, livings, who will eventually, I believe and trust, find themselves and their means of earning what they delight to call “an honest penny,” the objects of attention on the part of the Government. Money lenders, both big and small, will probably be the first. At all events it is to be hoped so, and amongst the laws and regulations under which these gentlemen conduct their lucrative negotiations should be this: AU money lenders charging the limit interest should be registered and forced to trade in their own names. So - called loan and other banks, companies, agencies, etc., etc., under which individuals can now work without attracting any of the odium which /rightly or wrongly attaches to the usury business, would thus be abolished and the borrower would know exactly whom he wns dealing with. Under the present method poor Smith

is frequently forced to borrow money at six per cent, from B. to pay A., who regrets he cannot renew, and Smith has no means of knowing that he is dealing with the same man all the time. The exorbitant rates for renewals also need attention, and, of course, there will be a limitation of interest. Later on —but all in good time, brokers aud agents will receive attention, and it will be probably decided that the rates now levied are exorbitant, and these will be reduced—by law. No doubt this will mean fewer gentlemen of this business persuasion will make a living than at present, but the fittest will survive, and there are altogether too many just now. Exactly how far the State can legitimately go in this matter is an extremely nice question. In most trades the laws of supply and demand and the spirit of competition regulates such matters automatically, but where trusts are formed to interfere with such laws and to enrich individuals at the expense of the public it is now recognised that the State must and will interpose. In the matter of adulterated solids and certain liquids, the State, as a protector of the public, has long done its duty fairly well. It is a pity it cannot do the same in the matter of alcohol. The might of the brewer is great, but after all he ought ■not to have the State so completely under his thumb that it is frightened or incapable of insisting that a certain standard of purity shall be maintained, and that a fine of, say. £5O to £ 100 shall be imposed for obtaining money under false pretences by selling liquor which is not what it is stated to be. By placing, that is, an inferior article in a bottle bearing some brand or name demanded by the purchaser. When this is done we shall have a most momentous decrease in the drunkenness returns. Meanwhile, it is something to be rid of the trading stamp.

A Chance for Bachelors.

The movement in England to pro mote, the emigration of women from the Mother Country to the Colonies has, I understand, received a certain stimulus lately from the growth of Imperial sentiment. With the exception of Victoria which has more women than men, all the other colonies of Australasia, with Canada and South A-frica, have a preponderance of males ; and it is considered that it would be of mutual benefit to the Old Country and the colonies that the former should send some of its women to these lands. London alone, it is calculated, has 500,000 marriageable girls who should go out to the Colonies ; and that of course is only a portion of the marriageable spinsters the United Kingdom could furnish. Housewives in the colony who are weary wrestling with the servant girl difficulty would assuredly welcome such an influx. Even although the girls came to be married they would have to find something to do until someone actually asked them in matrimony, and so their presence here would for a time at least alleviate the burden of our housekeepers. But it seems that though we are most willing to receive them and the promoters of the movement in the Old Country are .willing to bear the expense of their passage, the girls will not make the change. The inducement of high wages and the early prospect of a husband are apparently not sufficient to tempt them to these distant shores, though they know that to remain at Home means harder work, lower wages, and an infinitely smaller chance of getting married. No arguments seem strong enough to overcome this reluctance, and so the promoters of the movement for getting the surplus feminines of Great Britain transferred to the Colonies are said to be seriously thinking of subsidising the young colonials to come Home and marry the girls there. No doubt if sufficiently liberal terms were offered plepty of colonial youths would be prepared to take a trip to the Old Country. We have seen how willingly the contingents volunteered for South Africa and the war. Surely there would not be less alacrity shown were the quest matrimonial and not military, and the glory to be found in the court of Venus instead of in the field of Mars. I fancy there would be a rush of applicants if, as has been suggested, the Home authorities were to offer a free passage to England and back to every young eolonial who when he left the Old Country on Ms return took an English girl with Maa. Of course there would be a feeling of

resentment to such an arrangement among the colonial spinsters as long

as there were half-a-dozen of these left. They would ignore the fact that there are not nearly enough of them to go round, and that man wants a more extensive field of choice. There is little doubt, however, that if bonuses were offered to eligible young men to import their wives the value of the local maiden would go down. Because they are so much in the minority as compared with the men the colonial girls enjoy a distinction and privilege all their own. Think what would be the result if the colonial youth found a new market for wives on sueh advantageous terms as are suggested. The Infant Tyranny. Ladies will be pleased to know that their comfort is being specially consulted in the construction of the new railway carriages now being built. They must not imagine, however, that the Kailway Department is in a position to eater for them to the extent suggested by Mr Houston, when he asked the other day that swinging cots for infants should be supplied in certain carriages. 11 might be argued that babies have rights as well ns adults, and that if smoking cars are provided for men, and carriages of more than ordinary ease provided for the fair sex, the babies should not be ignored. But this the authoiities deny, doubtless on the ground that children in arms are carried free of charge. They are no more profit to the Department than the portmanteau you are allowed to stuff under the seat, and in the eyes of the traffic manager, guard and porter they are possibly of not a whit more ermsequence. There are also decided difficulties in the way of fitting up railway carriages with swinging cots for babies. How wordd they be affixed and in what number, and who would decide the right of this or that mother to make use of them when the supply was less than the demand? The immediate result of these contrivances would be to induce babies to travel, or rather their mothers to travel w.th them, and the consequent effect would certainly be a decided increase to the discomfort of the travelling public generally. We suffer under infaast despotism in public as well as private to an extraordinary degree, as it is. Probably one does not mind so imieh being tyrannised over by one’s own youngsters, but it is too bad that we should be victimised by the brats of other people. I don’t blame the innocents themselves for a moment. Of course they can’t be held responsible. The fault lies with their parents or guardians for the time being. ion will notice that, a mother with a baby or a nurse-girl in charge of one, regards herself as a supremely priviledged individual, entitled to set at nought every written or unwritten law of the land. Ami all because of the baby. The nurse-girl who insolently drives you from the pavement into the muddy street in order to avoid her perambulator; the mother who takes up a seat and a-half in the tramcar, or spoils your evening at the theatre with a peevish youngster-— they are all the same. Resent their disregard for your convenience and peace of mind by word or even look, and they will turn on you like a tiger. Fancy what it would mean if through special accommodation being provided for babies in our trains the traveller ran the risk of being confined in the small space of a railway carriage with a dozen little tyrants and their jealous keepers. From sueh a possibility may the Department preserve us!.

The Uninvited Guest. Quite recently in London William Astor, the American millionaire, gave a private concert, and Sir Berkeley Milne, without having received an invitation, attended the function. The millionaire resented the intrusion, requested the knight to leave, and even went so far as to announce in the papers next day that Sir Berkeley had been present uninvited. Society, so it is said, in its turn resented Mr Astor’s conduct, and threatened to cut him. That he deserved such a terrible fate is, however, an open question. If, as one version of the story goes, Sir Berkeley was Miss Astor’s lover, and was invited to the concert by the lady, papa, even if he did not favour the suit, made a precious fool of himself by creating such a fuss. If I remember rightly, Romeo was neither a bidden nor a welcome gueet •t the Capulets’ ball. He was not

even asked to it by Juliet. Yet Capulet Fere was too much of a stickler for the rights of hospitality to allow the presence of the young Montagne in his house to be the occasion of a quarrel. But supposing the romantic excuse for the knight’s appearing at the millionaire’s concert has no foundation in fact, and that the former deliberately intruded, there would be some justification for Mr. Astor’s conduct. If an individual will be guilty of the impertinence of poshing himself into a private house uninvited, when invitation is the rule of the evening, the host must be allowed some form of protection. In a ruder state of society the intruder would be promptly “chucked out.” Mr. Astor’s plan was to ask him to leave, and when he would not. to make public the fact that he was an uninvited guest. Fortunately such cases are of rare occurrence nowadays. Most individuals have too much self-pride and respect to go where they presumably are not wanted. What ean be more embarrassing for one than to arrive uninvited at a friend's house in the midst of some festivity—unless it be tne embarrassment of your friend when he receives you. Almost worse, however, is it to mistake your house and find yourself the guest of entire strangers when it is almost too late to get out of the difficulty. 1 have in my mind the case of two men friends, who were invited to a euchre party. Unfortunately neither of them knew precisely where their host's house was situated, and when they got to the street they were at a loss to find it. As it happened, there was a euchre parly going on at another establishment in the same street, and as luck would have it my friends concluded that must be the house they were searching for. It was not until they had actually got seated and play had commenced that by a chance remark they discovered their error. But by that time retreat was rendered most difficult, so out of consideration for the party they stayed on, while their friends in the other house were condemning their want of consideration in absenting themselves. Suppressed Speechmakers. One of the happiest character touches in David Christie Murray’s capital, though now almost forgotten novel, “Vai Strange,” is the anguish of the pompous father of the hero, on having given way to temptation and delivered bis wedding breakfast oration. at a dinner party the night before the ceremony. From a speechmaking standpoint he is a bankrupt. Precisely the opposite condition must have been the lot of members when the financial statement debate collapsed thet other night. Almost every member of the House, and certainly every new member was. the Parliamentary reporter tells us. primed with a carefully prepared speech, so the result. of this forcible corking' up of parliamentary eloquence must have been highly painfid, and one Wonders that there was not an explosion of some sori. Wise people, no doubt, discreetly avoided the company of legislators after the occurrence. At all times, and as many of us know to our cost, the society of M.H.R.’s is dangerous, they are always apt. to burst, so to say, and to inundate us with the frothy eloquence with which (as they say) they have been impressing the House. But a man charged with a speech which unkind circumstance has prevented him from delivering, a speech which cannot be put by for future use; sueh an one must be like unto those copper tubes of concentrated carbonic acid gas, and only lunatiics would approach them until they had been let go little by tittle. A man so placed would assuredly be on a hail- trigger, the merest touch, the smallest opportunity and off he would go. And then—well tihen the deluge. For capacity to bore, for staying power in the matter of talk, and for pertinacious button-holing, your new pledged parliamentary man is “facile princeps.” The least offensive are those who go on and on and on, and never want an answer or expect a remark. With practice it is possible to go to sleep and wake up when these have about run their course. It needs skill to avoid detection, but the thing can be. done. But the wretch who constantly breaks off to ask, “What did you think he said then? Or how do you think that struck them?” The man who watches to see if you are attending, and pulls yon up if you are not, this infamous bore is incorrigible, and if you fall into his clutches there ie no eaeapc. Positive brutal rudeness has been known to succeed.

but few ean achieve an offensiveness sufficient to discourage a parliamentary bore. The man who can do that has nothing to fear from anyone. There is no one he could not “squash” if he felt the need, no hide lie could not penetrate.