THE L.S.D. OF BRITISH COAL.

Hokitika Guardian, 9 June 1926, Page 3

THE L.S.D. OF BRITISH COAL.

“A table analysing costs and proceeds. in the last three months of 1925 shows that, if the subsidy be excluded, 73 per cent-of the output, was raised at a loss, hnd more than 60 per c?nt

> at a Joss of over ls ! per ton, and that • in South Wales, Scotland, Durham i and Northumberland, the proportions . of the coal raised at a loss,of Is or liicn-o per toil rluiged from 80 to 09 per cent. With the subsidy .in that period there was, taking the country as a whole, a profit of just over Is Gd per ton, but without t.hc subsidy the average -loss was just under Is Gd ]er ton. Apart from the subsidy, the only important, district working in the December quarter at a profit (0.215) was the clistern division, whereas in the exporting districts the losses ranged from 1.84 s per ton in Scotland to 3.20 s in South Wales and Monmouthshire.”—“Barclays Bank Monthly Review.” “SEE BRITAIN FIRST.” -•The Great Western Railway has taken the lead in recommending that the people of Britain should ‘See Britain First.’ But I venture to believe that an interest so common should be timnlatcd by those more intimately concerned. It is, I would suggest, a‘ matter for a national campaign, to he developed on lines similar to those which have won success for a complementary movemont in the United States. Tourist agents, local corporations, local chambers of commerce—aye, and even the Government—might well combine on a common basis to spread throughout the country the slogan and the suggestion: ‘See Britain First.’ ” —Sir Felix J. C. Boole, in the ‘‘Morning Post.”

ART OF SONG WRITING. “Friends often ask me how I write my songs, where do I find my subjects? Arc they histories of actual facts? These are questions which, it is difficult, if not impossible, to answer except vaguely. Something seen, something read of, something ‘told; some tragedy, some comedy of life of which one has heard or in which one has taken part; knowledge of people’s ways and peculiarities; love of beauti- ! ful things—the sea, the forests, the rolling hills, the waking voices of the dawn, the •solemn hush of night—all these things and the power to appreciate them go to the making of songs.” Fred E. Weatherly, in “Piano and Gown.” AS OTHERS SDK FS. ) "If people in England provide themselves with hooks just as Eskimos supply themselves with salt lisli, the deduction appears to he that English books are as good and necessary for people as salted meat. It seems that English authors think very much of the special fact that, their works will certainly have readers. T should say that this thought tills the minds of English authors with feelings, both of pleasure and of seriousness; that in their eas<? writing for the people, an endeavour to he lucid, and the goodwill to lie ill sympathetic and stimulating relations with their renders. Is it perhaps, too little for me to say that in Czccho-Slovakia, English hooks ought to he more widely read and better understood than has been the case hitherto?”—Karl Capek. of Czccho-Slovakia. THE WIDEST ART.

“If we would trifle, where can we hope to find a theme so inviting as Literature, the widest of all the nits at. once in its own scope and in the width of its appeal ? If some consideration of it illustrates the truth that the resources of literature are adequate for every human mood, flint will he justification ('Hough for the discussion of such a topic; for it may encourage the more eager devotion to the Muses.”— Tlie Bishop of Manchester, in “ The PiltM-im.”