AN APPEAL TO REASON.

Press, Volume XLIX, Issue 14833, 26 November 1913, Page 8

AN APPEAL TO REASON.

We life very . glad to see that the City Council drivers, upon reflection, have decided to disregard the bad advice of their false friends, Councillors Hunter and McCombs, and have returned to work. Any other course on their part would have been foolish in the extreme. The fact of their going on strike could not have affected the issue of the labour struggle in the slightest degree, and would not have produced a half-pennyworth of advantage to anybody in the wide "world. On the other hand, apart from the fact that they would have incurred fines under the Arbitration Act, it is absolutely certain that the majority, if not all of them', would have lost the comfortable billets which they at present enjoy. We hope that the other drivers will be similarly well-advised. Those of them who ore able to get back should take immediate advantage of the opportunity, otherwise it- is certain that a- number of them will find themselves left out in the cold, and will bitterly eiirse the day when they listened to the advice of paid agitators, ready to shed the last drop of their brother's blood to maintain their own little positions of power and pelf. We earnestly urge this course in the inf-erests of the workers themselves. If it were merely a question of ending the present struggle wo feel absolutely certain that the more men there are called out, the moro quickly will the strikers' funds be exhausted, and the more quickly will the fight be brought to a close. We desire most sincerely to see it concluded, as every.lover of this beautiful country must desire,-but we wish, to see

I the area of loss and snffering'limited as j much as possible. j Lastly, we implore the poor, misguided men. at Lyttelton to consider their position very seriously. Wβ ask them to consider what it was a month aeo. what it is to-day, what it is likely to be a month hence. A month ago I they were assured of work at good ! wages, and were looking forward to a busy season and good cheques. To-day ithey are walking about with bitterness in their hearts, and want creeping into- their homes.. A month henco many of them will bo anxiously asking for work and unable to get it. Can they not learn by the experience of others, or must they go through the bitter, grinding mill themselves? They can see what has happened at Auckland and Wellington. After what took place in Lyttelton yesterday they must recognise, as the men who have led them astray recognise, that the gamo of the Red Feds, is up, and that in a short time tho men who have been browbeating, bullying, and bamboozling thorn into following their lead will be glad to get away to some other field of action to escape the reproaches of the workers they have so grossly misled*. It is only necessary for the moro decent and law-abiding workers to assert their independence and think for themselves, to extricate themselves from tho terrible morass into which they have been led. They are not asked to abandon unionism or betray their fellows. They are not asked to accept worse conditions for themselves. All that is required is that theirs shall be a unionism which respects agreements, not a unionism which makes a jest of good faith and glories in setting agreements at defiance. The sands are rapidly running out, and unless tho saner, eoberer section of the Lyttolton workers venture to think and act for themselvco they will soon find their places filled by others, and for them the battle of life will havo to be begun once more, and fought all over again under greater disadvantages than before.

Tho Leader of the Opposition has made it very plain this year that he is not one of those who can stand the test of political adversity. To cut a good figure ho must have everything mado 6mooth and comfortable for him. His short spell in Opposition has already sadly damaged his sense of humour, otherwise we should suspect a humorous intention in his complaint concerning the inability of members to go with clear consciences to the Auckland Exhibition. Had the Opposition not set themselves, from tho very beginning of the session, to obstruct business by every possible device —from the laying of grotesquely baseless charges to stonewalling pure • and simple—the session would have been ended before now. The people of Auckland are very deeply concerned for the success of the Exhibition, and anxious that thero shall be nothing wanting to add to its importance, but inuoh as they may regret the failure of their hopes that all the members of Parliament would- attend, they- are unlikely, to lay the blame on the wrong shoulders. Sir Joseph Ward's'present concern for the Exhibition will not outweigh in Auckland's eyes the fact that his party prolonged the session simply because bo and they are poor losers.

Tho member for Avon is apparently in a mood to turn his vituperation upon anybody at aIL In the closing hours of tho stonewall his exasperation led him to describe the editorial writers of the country as "hired assassins."- No doubt, if he were asked to expand his views, Mr-Russell would explain that only those journalists are "hired assassins" who cannot quite share his own opinion of himself. Our colleagues on the "Liberal" side, he would explain, are not "hired assassins," but sincere and patriotic upholders of soUnd opinions. For our owii part, we regard otir "Liberal" colleagues as sincere Upholders of unsoUnd although they seem on occasion to share Mr Russell's view of their brethren in the Reform camp. There certainly is a type of Opposition journal which loves, when writing of Us poor wretches who, gravely doubt Mr Scrapie's and Sir Joseph Ward's fitness to control the country, to call us "hirelings." Most journalists, however, Ministerialist or Oppositionist, have a littlo • more sense of humour than to write in that way. Wβ are rather less hurt by the member for Avon's frantid language than we perhaps ought to be; for it is pretty plain that Mr Russell and his friends are alarmed at the effect which the criticism in the Reform newspapers is having unon tho "Liberals' " prospects.

The late Lftdy Halle, who; was so largely responsible for the spread of violin-playing among women, would have rejoiced had she lived to hear a recent concert at the Queen's Hall, for on that occasion Women Were for the first time included in Sir Henry Wood's famous orchestra. The innovation is interesting to all those who wish to see women's talents given their due recognition in art and science. The employment of women in orchestras is no new thing in tho English provinces, and women have won their way into two first-class organisations in Paris. But, except for harpists, women have hitherto been excluded from orchestras in London, and it is fitting that the leading orchestra in England should have been the first to break down the barrier. Sir Henry Wood tested fifty women applicants, and selected six, four violinists and two viola players. These players will bo paid at the same rate as the men. Sir Henry Wood's action will open new avenues of well-paid employment to the numbers of skilled jjerformers turned out by the- music schools.

No one who has studied the reports of the atrocities in the Putumayo, and knows something of the conditions in the wilds of the Amazon basin, will be surprised to hear of the fresh charges that are made about the treatment of native rubber-gatherers. The Putumayo is only a comparatively small district, and there was no particular reason for supposing that the appalling barbarities practised there were unique in the vast region that supplies so much of the world's rubber. Elsewhere thero is tho same temptation and the same, lack of authority. "Tho entire absence of government, which has nofc kept pace with the extension of revenue-yielding communities, has left the weaker members of those communi-

1 ties exposed to tho ruthless greed of the stranger," wrote - Sir Roger Casement in"his official report. The crimes of tho Putumayo, horrible as they aro, have their counterpart, I am assured, in other remote regions of the same lawless forest—though possibly not to the same terrifying extent." These remote regions of South America offer greater facilities for crime of this kind than any other part of the world. Africa gave-the world the Congo atrocities, but it has practically lost the title of the Dark Continent. Besides, a great part of Central Africa is under the control of Europeans in tho employ of strong and just Governments. But in South America great stretches of country lie far away from the seats of government, and authority, which, under the best conditions, is not particularly strong, cannot nierce the enormous forests, in tho gloom of which greed, niado moro brutal by the climate and the lack of civilising influences, works ite terrible purposes unchecked. The public conscience in England was deeply stirred by tho Putnmayo revelations, especially as Englishmen were indirectly concerned in the atrocities, and if it is proved that moro English capital is blackened with similar infamy, there will be an insistent cry for the removal of this additional blot on English honour. Tho performance of the Royal Artillery Band at King Edward's Barracks last night gave unlimited pleasure to one of the largest audiences ever assembled in Chrjstchurch, and our Auckland friends are to be congratulated on having secured a magnificent attraction for their Exhibition. Wo have no doubt that there will bo an equally large audience at the concert to be given this afternoon. We hope, however, there will bo a great improvement in the arrangements for admitting the public, which last night wore simply abominable. It was like fighting one's way through a football scrimmage, first to get tickets and afterwards to get into tho hall, and it will be a miracle if some of the ladies involved in tho melee do not suffer in health in consequence. Tho arrangements were almost as bad when Sousa's band was herOj and it makes one wonder whether there is ,no ono in Christchurch capable of showing a little common-sense in the matter of arranging for the admission of a largo audi-. enco to a place of public entertainment. On Monday, as our readers will recollect, we dealt with ■ the exact parallelism between tho stonewall of 1831 and tho stonewall which has just ended. In the course of our article we quoted some passages from a series of articles in which our local contemporary strongly denounced tho stonowallers of 1881, and laid down, in terms, which we have not bettered, the principle that a factious minority cannot bo allowed to "hold up" Parliament. Its reply to this inconvenient reminder of ite lapse from sound principles is the obviously inadequate and unsound one that the circumstances are different. Our contemporary, indeed, appears to feel the inadequacy of this plea, for it rests its case upon this statement :— L The Liberals feel that he (the Prime Minister) hns not tho least intention of putting anything at nil in its (the second ballot's) place, and therefore they are striving by every means within their reach,to retain the protection for majorities already on the Statute Book. [ Perhaps they may "feel" this way, but it is not what the "Liberals", "feel," I but what the Government proposes, ! that matters. Wβ have not yet come to the stage of government by the unfounded suspicions of a core-headed "minority. J All thosa people who have derived so much* , entertainment from "Liberalism's" determined courtship" of the Red Feds., and the Rod Feds.' increasingly violent rejections of tho offer of tho "discredited fragments," will bo pleased and amused to know that "Liberalism" is at it again. Ono of its newspapers is anxious that "tho progressive parties" ehould feallse "the need fof consolidating their . sadly divided forces." We are bound to say that our "Liberal" friends are not without excuse for their hope that this time they may be rejected with less contumely than usual. For they have given all tho proofs of devotion that they dared. The Red Feds, would have been .'better pleased had the Opposition gone the whole, length with them iri attacking the community and the Government, but they should remember the difficulties of their fellow "progressives." Tho "Liberals" are anxious to serve the Syndicalists without alienating that simple-minded section of the ''Liberal" public which would be stampeded by a too plain championship of the strike. In the meantime some of the Opposition newspapers are exceedingly angry at tho suggestion that the "Liberals" aro the allies of the Red Fede. This indignation does not quite square with the latest appeal to "the progressive pariv ies" to "consolidate their forces." They can hardly have ifc both ways. The action of Messrs McCombs and Hunter in doing their best to frustrate the Mayors appeal to the Council's employees to do their duty and avoid breaking the law has caUsed very, general indignation. It may be worth whilo reminding each of these two Councillors that when he took office he signed a declaration to this effect: —"I do hereby declare that I will faithfully and impartially, and according to the best of my skill and judgment, execute the powers and authorities vested in mc as Councillor of Chrietchurch by virtue of the Municipal Corporations Act, 1903." It need hardly be pointed out that these Councillors havo flagrantly broken this undertaking. If there are ho means of securing that Councillors elected to serve the city faithfully and impartially shall really do so, then it is clear that the law must be amended. If tho law is thus defective, Parliament may perhaps be excused for having assumed that no Councillor would be guilty of a flagrant betrayal of tho city's interests. But Messrs McCombs and Hunter have shown us all that when Parliament assumed that, it assumed too much.