TOPICS OF THE DAY.

Press, Volume LX, Issue 11498, 3 February 1903, Page 4

TOPICS OF THE DAY.

The experiment of a summer Summer school for teachers, held Schools, during the State school vacation, has been tried in Auckland during the past month with marked success, as many as three hundred teachers giving up the beet part of their holidays to the seTf-iinpoeed tasks of the school. The summer school is an institution which had its origin in the United States. Thousands of teachers assemble during the summer holidays at the American Universities and other educational centres, to receive instruction from experts in the vrork of their profession, and the movement has spread to England and the Continent, and promisee in lime to flourish in tfrj Australasian colonies. A summer school was held in Melbourne this month, under the auspices of the Victorian Department of Education. Provision had been made to accommodate 600 teachers, but even then considerably more teachers than could be admitted l came to town in the hope of being able to attend the classes. The Auckland school, which wa* organised by a committee of teaching enthusiasts,' was on a smaller and le.ss comprehensive scale, but the results appear to have amply justified the efforts of the promoters. The classes extended over a fortnight, and the course of instruction comprised lectures on the -various branches of manual, technical and natural science, the lessons in the manual and mental training of infante being given by Miss Hooper, the organiser of kindergarten work for the Victorian Education Department. Another excellent feature of the school was an exhibition of the latest text-books and the most approved appliances needed for kindergarten and manual training, plasticene and , modelling tools, relief maps, and chemical and physical apparatus. In the Melbourne summer echool similar subjects have been taught, with the addition of elementary science and art,, nature study—including gardening—needlework, and the science of agriculture. The " Auckland Star" warmly commends the promoters of the local summer school for filling "a distinct want in the teaching community," and urges the Education Department to take over the institution and extend its sphere of use* fulness. The most prominent An figure in the Venezuelan International "mess," as Lord CranFigure. borne t*nn» the preeent situation, is undoubtedly Mr Herbert W. Bowen, the American Minister at Caracas, in whose hands lie th* arrangements for arbitration on the mat* ters in dispute between Venezuela, and the foreign Powero. Judging from a biographical article on Mr Bowen appearing in one of the American magazines, and I from what one ham learned of Mm during J the present difficulty, he is a man of whom more will be heard In the future. He comee of New England ancestors, and can call himself a great-great-grand-nephew of Benjamin Franklin. His school and college career showed him possessed of fearless courage, and striking independence, trait* which got him into many combats and not a few differences of opinion with the authorities. Before settling down as a lawyer, he spent two periods abroad, the latter being devoted to the study of Italian and the cultivation of a very fine tenor voice. In 1890 'he wm appointed American Consul at Barcelona, and mnce then has been continually in the diplomatic service. In 1895 he became Consul-General at Barcelona, and for the next three years his position was not a pleasant one, for the agitation in Spain against the United States began before he Jiod held the office for a year, and it grew in intensity, culminating with the outbreak of the war. For the lost two years he was considered by the police to be in constant danger of ouaasination, and towards the end of Ws stay they would I not let him leave the consulate except to cross the square to get his meab at an hotel, and then they guarded him. The 'Spanish mob gathered outride the hotel dining-room, and shook toy pigs in the Consul's' face as a token of their opinion of his nation. Guards slept at the consulate, and secret police shadowed its occupant- day and night. Mobs congregated in front of the consulate, and on one occasion, at least, it looked as if a determined attack was to be made upon it, in order to eeize the national coat-of-arms, the eagle and shield, that was displayed over the door. On this occasion Mr Bowen was out of the building, but be pushed through" tiie crowd until no got his back to.lhe door, and then awaited results. Kednforceinent* arrived in the shape of one big man, and these two faced the angry mob until the police come and dispensed it. "I asked the stranger who the was," said Mr Bowes subsequently, "and he replied, 'I am Norman Harrington, of Chicago. This is my first day in Barcelona. It seemed to me then might be some trouble for the eagle np there, and I thought I would take a bit of it.'" Mr Bowen was the last American official, if not the last American citisen, to leave Spam when war was declared, and was conducted to the frontier in a train guarded by soldiers. Subsequently he was appointed to Persia, and later on to Venezuela, where he «tUI represents bis country. Hβ is an accomplished linguist, on authority and author on International law, and a minor poet, his verses being "not very good and not very bod." In the rapidity of modern Automobile inventive progress, the Railways, supremacy of the iteam railway may now Dβ threatened by the automobile. In Paris • c«ir method of aatomobfle railwaj com-

munlcation is described by a co-respondent of the London "Timee" ne being "beyond tfca aUge of experiment," The idea is to supersede the existing locomotive* and carriages by trains of automobiles, each of them &c large as the present carriage*, fitted, iike these, with a lavatory end refreshment bar, oommodiova enough to hold forty passengers, with luggage, and capable of running at a normal speed of 614 &&** &a hour. The company now pioneenn® the intention » confident of attaining this epeed on the new automobile line from Paris to Dijon, which is to be opened on June 18th next. It is thought, indeed, that the same rate could eaeily be maintained over the whole distance from Pan* to Nke. "An absolute revolution," is the phrase in which a leading French railway authority describes the innovation, and though it may sound exaggerated, the advantages which the correspondent before mentioned claim* for the new system go far to justify the description. The substitution of the automobile for the locomotive, he explains, '"dispenses in every train, short or long, slow or fast, with a weight of 110 tons. It .eaves the con- i siderable cost of locomotives. It abolishes smoke, eteam", noise, vibration, the jolt incidental to stopping and starting, and the necessity of stopping to take up water. It also abolishes all the men in charge or a locomotive except the engine-driver." Moreover, the automobile coste neither more nor less than the first-class corridor carriage, while the weight, including the traction apparatus, i» also the same. The slightest possible quantity of petroleum, it is stated, will convert the smallest possible quantity of water into the greatest propelling power of steam which can be produced. The extremely powerful vapour thus obtained acts directly on the wheels of the automobile. The petroleum" is soon exhausted, but the water, aft«r being transformed into vapour, condenses afresh, and can be turned into steam again the more quickly by reason of the heat which it still (retains. In front of every automobile is an apparatus producing, with a litre of petroleum per kilometre, sufficient steam power to propel the carriage with its forty passengere, and an overage amount of luggage, at a normal and almost minimum speed of 100 kilometres, or 614 miles, on hour, "without interruption, noise, or jerk." For the present the new system will only be used for traine-de-luxe, and as the present carriages cannot be converted, it is unlikely that there will be any reduction of rates for some time. While the French authorities are experimenting on their side of the Channel, lEnglish enterprise is for once not ai whit* behindhand on the other. The North Eastern Railway Company is building two auto-cars at -present on very much the same plara as previously described, to run between Hartiepool and West Hartlepool, where the ordinary train can only go slowly owing to the number of stoppage places. It is expected that on the autocan a speed of 30 miles an hour will be obtainable in 30 seconds—obviously a great improvement on the present system. If first.experiment* prove successful, the innovation will be extended to the whole of the Company's service.