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Hokitika Guardian, 25 March 1920, Page 2

In view' of the fact that all will have an opportunity of being i;,i very close | touch with the Prince of Walei, j;i a few weeks, references to the character and bearing of the. Heir ApiKirent will l,>e of interest. A noted English writer who has made a .Speciality of personal interviews, lias just issued a volume in which pride of plncxi is given to an essay on the Prince of Wales, who provides a text for some reflections

on tbe re-emergence of youth as a I force in the nation. Youth, Mr Ray- { mond declares, went out of the world [ With the fall ,of Napoleon. Before j Waterloo it commanded armies and created empires. A Clive, a Wolfe, a Pitt could make themselves immortal at an age when the professional man of yesterday was still waiting for a patient or a brief. But after Waterloo all that was changed; for a hundred years seniority was the only passport to promotion and the man in the forties was regarded as an immature ; boy. The war brought the day of enianei- | pation. Youth, which had been knocking at the doors, ceased to knock, and burst his way through. “We are now ‘on a wave of reaction, of which no man can foresee the ultimate result.” The Prince symbolises the spirit of the times; he is young, unconventional, curious, eager to see, and do everything for himself—a happy augury for the future. The Prince is credited with a charming manner and he should be much at home in the colonies where •unconventional methods prevail. We may judge the Prince by the desire expressed through the Government that he specially wishes to meet the soldiers and children on his tour. This desire couples too important units in the national life—the men and women who saved the Empire, and the future

men and women who will people the Empire. There are indications that a rousing welcome will be given Prince Edward throughout his Dominion tour. Here in Westland as Mr Massey expressed it in his cordial wire to the Mayor the other day, “the ontriot-e Citizens will do full justice to the important occasion.” Of that there is no possible doubt whatever. “Every reader of romance knows that discouraging part of the story when the unknown. Knight is liquidated as a mystery and not yet re-established as a going concern of human interest.” These are the words with which Mr Raymond, an English author and critic, begins a somewhat caustic “appreciation” of President Wilson. He com-

pares the rarified altitudes where he lived in Olympian serenity during tile war to the descent to earth at the Peace Conference. Before the Armistice he had played the part of “spiritual munition-maker for the Allies.” Perhaps he may have appeared occasionally to approach that super-human tolerance which looks as kindly on the appetite of the wolf as on the innocence of the lamb. But this merely strengthened the popular view that here was’ altruism and judicial impartiality incarnate. Tlu* conference revealed him in a new light; it came a surprise to many to learn that Mr Wilson was well, shall we sav,\ quite a good lumd at driving a bargain. Now that the United States has rejected the Peace Treaty ignored, the fourteen points, and shown contempt for the League of Nations covenant/ Mr Raymond will, require to revise his “appreciation” in tiie light of the latest developments; Mr Wilson occupied a singularly prominent place while America, thought about entering the war, and no iess prominent place while the great country was briefly in the war. Now that America, is so well out of the war the pedestal has crumbled to nought, and Mr Wilson does not appear to be even of influence in his own country. 'His rnana. has departed, and there is not any indication that his mantle has been handed on to anyone of sufficient importance to arrest attention. America for the moment, vast as she L, lacks a striking figure to fill the popular imagination. Mr Wilson’s personal failure emphasises the national loss centred in the demise of the late Theodore Roosevelt.