THE GLOBE. FRIDAY, JULY 8, 1881. MINIATURE FISH.

Globe, Volume XXIII, Issue 2267, 8 July 1881, Page 2

THE GLOBE. FRIDAY, JULY 8, 1881. MINIATURE FISH.

We are glad to notice that public attention has been drawn to the practice which has prevailed so long of bringing fish of miniature size to market. A glance at any of our fishmongers' shops will show that two-thirds of the fish—more particularly flounders—are too small for food. This wholesale and wanton destruction simply means extermination, and the end of it will be that one of the best of our sources of food supply will be shut up. The evil is intensified by the fact that such small fish are entirely wasted, because they are useless as food, and therefore while the supply is being wasted no one is benefited. The matter having now been brought prominently under the notice of the authorities, we trust that the law will be enforced, so as to prevent any fish below a certain size being taken. If this is not done, then flounders will become a thing of the past, and thus a healthful article of food will bo entirely cut off.

CRIMINAL CHILDREN. The case of the boy R. B. Hardie, who has been before the Court daring 1 the past few days, reveals a state of things which certainly should no longer continue. As will no doubt be remembered, the boy was convicted of larceny, not for the first time, and then arose the question what was to be done with him ? Why there should have been a special exception made in this case from the ordinary rule of commitments to Burnham, we do not know, but the fact remains that for \ the first time some idea seems to have j struck the authorities that this was not the proper course. This, then, brings to light the somewhat astonishing fact that the law has for some time been practically sot at defiance. The Act distinctly and positively says that no convicted child shall be sent to the Reformatory or Industrial School. And very properly so, for wo can easily understand how a scamp like the boy Hardio would soon contaminate a whole school. Tet, so far as we can learn, this has been done more than once, and children convicted of larceny have been sent to Burnham, to mix with those whose only crime is the desertion or neglect of their parents. This should not be, because it is wrong to force these children to mix with boys who have commenced a career I

of crime. Not only is it a wrong to th> individuals concerned, but to the publit generally, because by this means the evi. is intensified, and so far from being a reforming institution, this will simply purn the Bnrnham School into a nursery for criminals. If, as we are informed, this practice is still going on, it should at once be stopped, and the neglected or deserted children, for whom and for whom alone the institution was projected, relieved from the necessity of daily and hourly communication with juvenilethieves. That a place for the reception of the latter is required no ono will deny, but it is quite another thing to herd them with children who presumably are yet unstained by crime. We trust that the Government will see into this matter, and stop a practice which is fraught with the greatest amount of evil, not only to the children in the school, but to the community as a whole. HOUSES OP CALL. We see that a suggestion has been made to the Licensed Victuallers Association te establish houses of call for particular trades liinilarly to the practice existing at home. Such a course cannot, we think, bo too strongly condemned. Temptations to drink are unfortunately far too rife in the colonies without adding yet another to the long list. By carrying out the scheme proposed, men would be weaned from their homes, and come to) regard the publichouse in that light. It would afford them an excause to loiter and hang about publichouses all hours of the day and night on the pretext that they were waiting to be employed. Such a state of things in a small community like this cannot but be regarded as disastrous in the extreme, and if the law has power to prevent it we trust that it will be exerted. It will, of course, be argued that it is a custom at home. Whilst admitting that many of our old English customs are well worthy commemoration in our new home, there are also a number far more honored in the breach than in the observance. This forming bouses of call appears to come under the latter category, and we hope never to see it established here.