NOTES OF THE DAY.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1644, 10 January 1913, Page 4

NOTES OF THE DAY.

The other day we had some reference to the case of Sir Stuart Samuel, M.P. for Tower Hamlets, and the British Government's insistence that a Parliamentary Committee, and not the Courts, should decide whother his firm's dealings with the Government had disentitled him to his seat. It will bo rememborcd that the Opposition objected to the Government's proposal,; and that several speakers on both sides spoke of the possibility that somebody might subsequently - prosecute Sir Stuart Samuel in the Courts. Mr. Lloyd-George and others .dealt freely with this point, in such- a way as to convince everyone that whether any such prosecution would bo instituted remained to be seen. The' New Witness (as the Eye-Witness has been renamed), was so convinced and.it announced that on November 25 it had on its own account issued a writ against Sir Stuart Samuel for the recovery of £46,500, whioh it claimed ho ha,d forfeited by sitting and;voting in tho House after having disqualified himself. The ijaper explained that it had taken this action in tho public interest, because it did /not wish the matter to be burked by a.Committee of the House. Then a' remarkable thing happened. On the "very next November 26, all the morning papers, wero "officially" informed that a prior writ had been issued'on .November 11, and that an appearance was entered on behalf of Sir Stuart Samuel on November 19—several days before the Government so misled the Houso in the debate. As the' Tablet observed: "It is certainly surprising that it should have been "possible to preserve secrecy in a 'matter of so much public, interest for a whole fortnight, and\almost equally surprising that the name of the first informer should Btill be withheld from the public." Had the House not.been grossly deceived by' Mr. Lloyd-George and the Attorney-General, the farce—and scandal, as it now becomes—of setting up a Committee, to prejudice a case already in the King's Courts would have been impossible. _ Tho New Witness has done a public service in forcing-the exposure of a piece.of sharp practice by tho British Radicals quite as, "slim" as tome of the little _ tricks of one , or two dead-and-buried oolonial Governments we know of.' ■

Our . Cbrißtchurch • correspondent telegraphed \iß yesterday a brief extract from an articlo in tho antiReform organ in Christchurch upon tho not very crcditablo record of that city in relation to the defence systom. It is a little surprising that it should, be the anti-Reform paper in which alarm, and some disgust, , are expressed at tho lawlessness of the extreme Radicals of that very fine!city. But it ia natural enough that .ljf on tho dofenco 'sypicrn, f0r,,0" largo section of its citizens, regret that, it 'is, tho.blot on the/ State.; l"Ohristehurch ' haa : no ; reason to be, proud of its distinction, J ' : the' article" concludes.'; Yet'it has as much right to be proud of this distinction as of its distinction as having declared in 1011 iagainst clean. democratic govr eminent. _- We cannot believe that Canterbury is really saturated with that national "freethought". which rejects the twin doctrines of patriotic effort and of clean government. They aro only, a section of the Canterbury community who are guiltly of this double national treachery: the small section which has set; itself to hamper the defence schcmo there, is the section which supplied the margin: that turned the Canterbury scales'in faVour of Spoils politics. The cause of Spoils' polities' . <iould only bo upheld by such appeals as would spur on the unpatriotic national . freethinkers'/ to that opposition which even tho leading antiReform newspaper in Canterbury appears to be ashamed of. "The evidence of progress and of enthusiasm in other parts," its article says, "is unanimous and emphatic, so emphatic, indeed, as to suggest that Christchurch ,must be afflicted ; by pomo particularly troublesome disease." This is an interesting ad,mission. But there is no need for alarm. Anti-militarist and antiReform feeling in Canterbury are alike in size and in origin, and both will disappear together. ...

Fori some time past public interest in the war has been confined to two points : the fate of Adrianoplo, and the possibility of a wider war arising out of Servia's claim to a strip of, Albania and' an Adriatic gateway. It would appear that tho Turks are not hopeful of holding Adrianoplo without outsidd intervention of some sort, for the Turkish delegates; to the conference in London are reported to have ascribed the suspension of negotiations to the Allies' hope that Aarianople would fall. As to tho Austro-Sorvian dispute, thero is no need to expect that a general war will wait on Austria's intervention, for all the Powers are agreed that Servia can not,bo granted anything more,than a free commercial use of the Adriatic—which she oould obtain by owing a mere railway strip to Durazzo, or by having running powers over a railway to the ooast guaranteed to her. Of course, if Servia insists upon a prize- which Austria will contest with guns, anything may happen. It may bo inconceivable that Russia will Btep in, that Germany will follow, and that France.and then Britain will become involved in a general war;' but an Austro-Servian war might grow into almost anything. Milch of the diplomacy behind the situation—which meansj many, of the real facts of the position—must remain hidden, and in our opinion, rightly so. T|ie London Times, by tho way, entered on November 26 a strong protest against "the chancelleries who make war—"human lives as pawns," "the jargon of diplomacy," and all tho rest of it—a protest so unusual in The Times and so foreign to The Times' method of cool and sensible expression as to carry its unsoundness on its faco. No doubt the article was meant, however, as a sort of warning, to anyone cunccrned, that Britain would not involve herself in any wars that may be forced by the parties in tho Balkans.