WITHOUT PREJUDICE

Dominion, Volume 15, Issue 56, 30 November 1921, Page 4

WITHOUT PREJUDICE

NOTES AT RANDOM

(By

T.D.H.)

Gas is now stated to be the most deadly instrument of warfare. —Events in Hutt Valley seem to bear this out.

Sumo men stand on principle. Others would if they had any to stand on.

The casualty list at the American picture theatre fire was yesterday refioited as 50 dead and 500 severely burned. Today it is down to three dead and 20 seriously injured.—Perhaps to-morrow the American newspaper people will discover there was not a fire at all.

It was on November 30, A.D. 69, that St. Andrew is stated to have been martyred by crucifixion at Patrae, in Aciiaia. There are several versions of how this Apostle became the patron, saint of Scotland. One is that one Regulus was shipwrecked with tho bones of St. Andrew on the Scottish coast, near where St. Andrew’s now stands. Another is that the relies were brought to St. Andrew’s by Bishop Acca, of Hexham, when he was driven from his see in 732. It was somewhere about 750 that St. Andrew became the patron saint of Scotland. Tim St. Andrew’s cross is believed to represent the peculiar form of cross on which the saint was crucified, but the alleged relic, of tho actual cross used, which is, or was, in tho convent of St. Victor, near Marseilles, shows; it to havs been of the ordinary shape. The error is alleged to have arisen through the pictures of the Apostle always showing his cross resting on the end of the cross-beam and point of the. foot. Achaius, King of tho Scots, and Husigus, King of Picts, saw this cross in the heavens the night before they beat Athelstane in a battle, and thereafter St. Andrew became the patron saint of Scotland.

There is no more respected figure amongst tho statesmen and savants of tho Empire to-day than Mr. Arthur Janies Balfour, its chief representative at the Washington Conference now in session. And November 30 is a day that Mr. Balfour remembers very carefully, for if he is a great Imperialist he is so foa? the very reason that he is a great Scotsman —indeed, the terms are synonymous I A year or two ago, at the 248th St. Andrew’s Celebration of tho Royal Scottish Corporation (London), in presenting tho toast of the society, Mr. Balfour said that ho did not wish as a Scotsman among Scotsmen to spend all his time in praising themselves. In the opinion of most Scotsmen it was an unnecessary operation. “And there is one praise which I hope I may be permitted to give to our own country, and it is this: that wc have really beyond all tho world set an example of liow to reconcile naturally, and completely, and without effort, two things which at first eight do not so?m easily reconcilable. 1 mean an intense aud ardent patriotism for a part which yet only reinforces and strengthens tho larger patriotism for the whole.

This passing association of St Andrew’s Day with Mr. Balfour and Washington brings other random thoughts, as. for instance: What is really happening in the American capital? What will it all amount to?—and, as pessimism tends to grow, Who will, pay? The last query is prompted, no doubt, by the reported willingness of President Harding to extend tho hand of comradeship to our late arch-onemy. The attitude of the President makes one pause and ask: How much do we remember? How mtieh do we care? Perhaps the satire of Alfred Noyes is justified : -

Tho cymbals clash, And the dancers walk; With long silk stockings. And aims of chalk. Butterfly skirts, And white breasts bare; And shadows of dead men ■Watching ’em there. It is all very well to tinker with the barriers, but tho world cannot do without them. The national spirit is no more dead in Germany than it is in Scotlandarid Monsieur Briand has left us and the revellers and tinkerers (of Washington) in no kind of doubt as to its life in France. Some of the dead mon Noyes speaks of paid the penalty of the success of tho “Little Englanders” in “promoting’ the peace of thte world” by restricting (British) armaments for nearly ten years (1906-1914). Some of the living remember the price we paid for that limitation of armaments. Dome of the unborn, w.ho may pay—well, will they have cause to wonder why we experimented twice, and curse, the peace-seekers at Washington? Let us hope we will make a safe job of it this time.

"Oh, I’ve just seen a most distressing sight, most touching—a poor child who had lost her mother,” said the dear old Professor, as he sat down hurriedly, and furtively wiped away a tear with his Alice blue-bordered handkerchief. “Most distressing, I assure you. Mother not to be found anywhere.” “But why didn’t you tell her toehold on to her mother’s skirts?” I suggested. “I did, my boy: that’s the cruellest part of it all. The poor child said she would have done so, but she couldnt reach ’em.”

London in foggy weather, such as vt is having now, is n. very good place to be out of. Clean. whitish-grey fog in the English countryside or out in the North Sea is one thing, but the yellow or black pen soup of London is quite another. It breeds coughs and colds, and after you blow your nose once or twice out in ft London fog you need a clean handkerchief. A white collar incautiously exposed to a London fog on the top of a bus \ for twenty minutes or so is fit only for the wash tub. They say the fogs are not so bad now as they were a quarter of a century ago, as the smoke nuisance is kept down. The domestic coal fires are stated to be the worst offenders now, but according to statistics only 25 per cent, of the coal used in Britain goes-, into domestic consumption, so the fogs must have been pretty desperate before tho .smoko abatement by-laws were enforced on commercial users. If the clerk of the weather would let London have a little more of the breezes he bestows on Wellington it would soon make an end of London’s fogs. The English fog is limply the formation of cloud at th* ground level. It occurs mostly after calm, starry, winter nights when there has been a sharp drop in the temperature. If a breeze springs up that is the end of the land fog. The North Bee, and Channel fog is a different affair, nnd is caused by warm air striking much colder water, and is not so readily blown away. Sometimes, of course, n sea fog is blown inland, while a land fog. on the other hand, will drift out over the sea.

Two mon were boasting of the merits of their respective wives. "My old woman.” said one. "won’t enter a greengrocer’s shop. She buys all our vegetables straight from tho farm, so they are pice and fresh.” "Well.” replied the other, "my old woman doos better than that. She went to tho market gardener and insisted on choosing a marrow that was still growing. 'How much for this one?’ she says. 'Eightponce,’ says he. ‘Too much.’ she says. ‘What’s the price of this little ’un?’ ‘Fonrpence.’ ‘All right, I’ll have it,’ and pays for it on the spot. Then she says. 'Don’t cut it now. I’ll call for it. this day week!’’” HOPE. Yon do not love mo dear, you say, There’s no use trying; Perhaps you may some future day, My soul keeps crying. A seed I’ve planted in your heart— Without, your knowing; Some Spring you’ll waken with a start To find love growing. —Percy Waxman.