BUILDING MATERIALS.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXV, Issue 1970, 4 January 1907, Page 3

BUILDING MATERIALS.

ALL ROUND ADVANCE. “Yes, there certainly has boon 111 'S all round advance of 10 per cent, ii :I 'j the price of building materials. Tin J*- 1 increase in some lines lias, of course 111 been much more marked, but, genor orally' spouking, 10 per cont. is n ss fair approximation.” This remark lo was made by the head of a big wlioley sale house to a Post reporter. 111 12 l_ months, 110 said, shoot-load lias adI vanned well over 30 per cont., tlio d rise in the prieo of copper lias been o phonomonal during recont years, ow--0 ing to the enormous domain! for 0100I- trie cables and electrical appliances e of all kinds, in which hopper is used, t j The demand lias outrun the supply, 0 j with the consequence that prices 8 J have gone soaring upwards. Two 3 {years ago, copper was selling at £53 I per ton. In October, 1905, it went , to £7O 12s Gd, and to-day's cable- • gram gives the price at £lO7 IDs. > Tin lias also advanced rapidly. Lead ' has moved upwards in the past two years from £l2 5s to £l9 10s. Antimony has actually risen from £2O to £lO5 in two years. Similarly iron has risen in price, Imt not to tile same extent as tin and coppo 1 '. In inquiring elsewhere about tlie price of other building materia is, tlie reporter was informed that scrim, for instance, is to lie advanced 25 pci cunt. Wallpaper is 011 the up-grade »' Now Zealand. ft is stated "that tho English manufacture is ousting tlie German article, save in the case 1 of a few lines, which ' the British , manufacturers do not trouble about. 1 “Generally speaking, the Englishmen* j -are heating the Germans,” was the . way in which the head of a leading Wellington firm put the case Glass, Oil account of the strikes at Home, I experienced a very big rise at one time during tlio year. Brices have probably risen five per cent., and there are indications that further c advances will be recorded shortly. ( Even, picture frames iiavo advanced s 15 per cent. The ambitious young v man who dreams of sotting up a g household 011 liis own account will, e apparently, need to remodel his esti- y mates.

A RUSSIAN TRIAL. On the first anniversary of the granting of the so-called “constitution” to Russia, some Russian pallors made a list of the fruits of tlie year, which included 523 papers and reviews stopped, and 647 prosecutions of editors. A little sketch by Air. John Foster Fraser shows, however, that the Court is not always against the Press, and that a clever lawyer may geb a journalist off even when lie breaks the law. The trial was at Kazan, and tlio editor and

publisher of the “Evening” were charged with printing, two days after the smothering of tlio Duma by Imperial ukase, an article in which it

was said that the news of tho closing o< : the Duma came like a bomb among the people; that the people must now be ready to stand in their places and use their power, and that this time there must be no bloodshed for nothing. According to Air. Fraser, the judges were not fearful-looking men, but courteous gentlemen who might

teach something to many a County Bench in England. There seems to be no doubt as to the construction to

be put on the passage complained of, but counsel for the defence was equal to tho task. In these stirring times tho authorities were hysterical, and

the censor was a fool who could not read plain Russian. True, the article was vigorous, Tho people must stand in their place? Of course they must. What crime was there in telling the people that? Everyono in court was standing in liis place. The people were to use their power? By what right did the censor decide that tlie power was used for harmful purposes ? _ Was there not the power of tlie brain ? Was there not the power of love? The assertion that this time there must be no bloodshed for nothing, was it not merely a protest against tho needless waste of blood

in these revolutionary times? Impressed by these arguments, tlie judges acquitted the prisoner; but, remarks Air. Fraser, “if we sent editors to prison in England for writing that sort of tiling, no judge would allow himself to be so bamboozled as to what was tlio moaning of tlie writer.” The editor, it may be mentioned, bad been in prison for several months, and there was no guarantee that tlie acquittal would save him from Siberia. As one of tho public in the court explained to Air. Fraser, no trial is needed for deportation to Siberia. It is enough that the political police think you dangerous. You may be seized on tlio night of your acquittal and hurried off across Russia without anyone knowing. So tlie sensational novelists are right after all.