NOTES OF THE DAY

Dominion, Volume 13, Issue 191, 8 May 1920, Page 6

NOTES OF THE DAY

.In a statement to the House of Commons which, is reported to-day the .British Food Controller (Me. M'Cunpy) is at pains to discredit ■ an anticipation entertained in some of. .an. early fall in the price of ■ For what they are worth, his opinions place ■ the prospects of food-exporting countries, like New Zealand in an encouraging light,' but he is perhaps laying rather, more emphasis than is warranted o_n the factors of scarcity and diminished, production and taking insufficient account of the extent to which consumption in many countries is restricted by hard necessity and not least by' the shortage of transport facilities. In any case a belief on the Minister's part that' the prices of foodstuffs generally are likely to be maintained or increased does not justify the policy under which' the clearance of accumulations of New Zealand meat is delayed' by! the maintenance of unduly high prices. This policy is evidently unjust both to the consuming public and to producers in the dominions, and must tend in a serious degree to limit production. In what he has to say about.the wheat outlook, however, Mr. M'Ctjrdy seems to-be .on firm ground, and his obse/ftations on this subject suggest incidentally that the New Zealand Government is taking the right course,in doing:everything it can to encourage the production within the Dominion, of wheat supplies adequate for local consumption. * * * --. * The so-called sensational revcla.tion in John Bull of the particulars of Lady Astor's divorce from a former husband seems to be a somewhat forced example of sensational journalism. According to the recent cablegram .which dealt at some length with the incident it is alleged that the divorce proceedings instituted by .'Lady ' Astou (then Mrs. Shaw) seventeen years ago "were carried through with great secrecy." As "a-.matter of■. fact the essential particulars- were published long before Mr. Horatio Bottomley fade his "sensational' revelation." or instance, in the course of an article published on December 13, ' 1919, just after Lady Astor's election to the House'of Commons, the Literdnj. Digest mentioned that she was first married in 1897 to Eodert Gould Shaw, of Boston, member of a family with notable Abolitionist, associations, and that the Shaws were divorced some six years after the marriage. Apparently Mr. Bottomley hopes to sway opinion in the" present controversy over the British Divorce Bill by contrasting Lady Astor's personal experience with;.'her v present opposition to easier divorce.' At this distance, * however, the attempt looks somewhat petty' if not contemptible, and it is not clear in any case that any inconsistency on the part of the lady, member for Plymouth is disclosed. Opposition to easier divorce . does not-necessarily.'imply opposition to divorce within limits. Most people; no doubt,' will conclude that a personal experience of seventeen vears. ago has little enough bearing on' the present-day attitude of a member of Parliament in dealing with a national problem. * * * * A small and unobtrusive party of newspaper correspondents arc accompanying! the Prince .on his travels. The public'.hears little of them, but they ' play a large and important part in the tour. It is through them that Britain and'the rest of the Empire will derive their knowledge of .what has taken place, and of the loyal enthusiasm with which the Heir to the Throne has been welcomed overseas. Without the work of the Press correspondents the British ' public would have maintained but a casual and intermittent touch with ■ the progress of the tour. The four correspondents'accompanying the Renown are journalists of wide experience, and.the publicity they arc giving to the patriotic fervour of the people will have a valuable effect in strengthening and deepening the ties of sentiment and loyaltv which bind the Empire together. They arc the chief agents in a publicity campaign of as much importance as any con ducted during the war. It is notablo also that-as his oolitical adviser the PitiNCE'has with him Colonel Grigq, formerly Dominions editor of The Times, and afterwards editor of thtBound Tabic, a review devoted, entirely to matters of Imperial moment. Such an 'appointment in itself is significant, and means that His. Royal' Highness will bckept very well info v mcd of the affairs of the' Dominions he is visiting. It may be taken also as indirectly a'delicate tribute to the power of tho Press. .* .# * * . An event of more than local lntcri est was the. decease of the Nelson • Colonist last week after an cxisisncp ■ of sixty-three years. The Colonist i was not the pioneer newspaper ot ■ Nelson,. for the Examiner was ali ready well on in years when it was ! founded in the seventeenth year of [ Nelson's settlement, but it lived to i be one of the oldest-established nnws- ; papers remaining outside tho chief [ centres. New Zealand is certainly • very liberally supplied with newai papers of one sort and another. The i present figures show over sixty daily i papers, and fifty-five bi-weekly and • tri-weekly journals. This is a large I number for a population of less - than a million and a quarter, and ' there is no doubt that many of the ' smaller journals are having a hard - struggle at present with the paper - shortage and the general high costs i of production. It is, however, a mafc- - tor for keen regret that the Colonist 3 should have been obliged to close i its long and honourable career. In ; the early days when Nelson was n - centre of relatively much greater imfc poiVance than to-day, the Colonist - |/laved a prominent part in politics. - and played it well under some notf- able editors._ The traditions of those 1 days it maintained throughout its s career, and we can only re-echo the l regret that has been expressed in 3 Nelson that it wasnot possible tn - find some way of tiding over the pre--3 sent difficult period until the dawn £ of brighter day*.

It is the custom of.some schools of political thought—not, as we well know, without their representatives in Now Zealand—to declare that tile Monarchy represents an archaic and useless survival in the body politic. The tide of patriotic feeling which has swept ever Wellington. during the last few days may well give such thinkers food for thought. Their approach to politics suffers the de feet of being too much based on. tho material side and guided too much Jby the cold, hard light of reason. Wo must have the material means of lifo before wo can live,, but a life concerned- with nothing but those means is not an inspiring one. Nor will reason unaided take us far, for ' who is there that lives because he has reasoned it out that he should?. Emotion is a force that figures small in socialistic text-books, but emotion shapes our course through life more widely and more wisely than wo are aware. We cannot conceive that the visit of any President could stir up the same overpowering senti- - ments of unity and loyalty that have marked the progress of the Princ;: of Wales through New Zealand. Those sentiments arc the decisive factor in maintaining the British Empire, and what the world woul3 hs without this great commonwealth.of' free nations to which we belong w*.' can leave our "advanced" political thinkers to imagine. The Monarchy stands for something more, for it embodies the idea of the continuity of the race, and it stands also for an ideal of kingly chivalry, an ideal that has lost none of its lustre in the behaviour of the Prince of Wales to those who have assembled to greet him. The fine and generous sentiment evoked by the Prince's visit, is • a thing that New Zealand would'be poor indeed without. • .» • • Now that Wellington's open-air functions in connection with the visit of the Pr'nce of Wales arc over, a .few observations cm them may'he of "alu'e. to the cities and towns in the south, whose turn is yet to come. , Several times in' Wellington our demonstrations have been marred by the'public crowding in on spaces that should have been kept clear.' This not only spoils the spectacle for the great mass of those present, but must be decidedly unpleasant and embarrassing for the'PRiNCE and his staff. At Newtown Park swift action by one man at the outset would probably have sufficed to prevent what for a time threatened to be a swamping of the whole proceedings by the crowd. Again, the Petone pageant yesterday was overrun by the. spectators, with the result that nobody save those in the front row in the immediate vicinity could really see what was going on. An energetic and well-organised body of stewards would have made the pageant a different affair from what , it was. The moral for centres yet unvisited is, keep your crowds well in hand. Their loyalty and enthusiasm and desire to see as much of , the Prince as they can are only too likely to make them overstep bounds. New Zealand has a reputation' for sturdy patriotism, and it is worth a little trouble to maintain one for good manners as well. Another wise move would be for the municipalities to make a corner in confetti until . the Prince's visit, is over, and prevent the silly practice of confettithrowing.