PUBLIC OPINION.

Hokitika Guardian, 25 October 1927, Page 1

PUBLIC OPINION.

CONFERENCE AT CANBERRA

An Empire. Forestry Conference will begin in Perth during the firstweek of September next year. Six weeks will be spent in Australia, (part in each State), while the main conference, which will last a week, will ho held iti Canberra. After that the delegates will leave for a fortnight’s tour of New Zealand.

AUSTRALIA’S SHORTAGE

Quoting Mr A. J. Gibson. Conservator of Forests in Bengal. India, who is at present investigating A.ttstraiiii’s forest resources on behalf <d the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research. Mr Ellis said that “within twenty years, unless adequate precautionary measures are taken. Australia’s reserves of sottwoods will have disappeared. Sottwoods comprise nine-tenths of the world’s total timber consumption, and a high authority in London predicts a world shortage of softwoods within twentylive years. Australia will he the first country to feel tlie pinch. Indeed, it is ‘doubtful whether her present stocks will last even fifteen or twenty years. Already the Commonwealth imports about £3.000,000 worth of softwoods every year, and the amount is growing.”

CHILINTAKE ISLANDEBS

Hand in hand in a simple childlike way. the powerful natives oi the Gilbert Islands invaded the wnrslnop Laburnum when calls were made at various places during July. To them a visit by a unit of the Navy was a rare and memorable occurrence. To open-eyed wonder they looked over the ship, and inspected the complicated mechanism of the guns and the engine room. At Tarawa, the headquarters of the district officer of the Northern Gilberts, the, native boat-n,-n gave the Laburnum a magnificent reception in 94 of the outrigger canoes, each with a single white sail spread to the breeze. Their rhythmic paddle display was carried out to the accompaniment of appropriate island melodies, in much the same way as their rhythmic dancing ashore.

THE ÜBIQUITOUS .MATCH. “It is amazing the lack of <ate taken by garage employees in all port-, of the country when handling t,o nzi.tc." said a Wanganui motorist who returned last- week from an extensive motor tour of the Dominion. TT© referred, says an exchange 10. the practice of smoking while fiUmK tanks with petrol and cleaning par ", of vehicles with the ".flammable spirit “ft is a. wonder to me that more accidents do not occur.” he remarked. “11 only requires a spark to ignite bon/in© fumes and the damage is done.” The Wanganui man. who

is a motorist of long experience, ©unci dors that smoking near exposed benzine is the greatest risk a motorist could run.

“808 rx” SUGGESTED. ■‘it's a bit premature. a I*l *■ would rather see it tried out.” said a councillor at a meeting ot Ml© Mount Eden Borough Council lately, when a letter was received stating Unit a large number of people were desirous of showing appreciation of the action of Mr T. K. Siiley, M.T., who was largely responsible for the Summer Time Act being brought into force. It was stated tlmt Sir Trnbv King was the president ot -lie movement, it was asked that a collection should he msule, the largest subscription to he a shilling. “Heler d to the Bowling Committee,” said another councillor iacetieuMy. ‘T hc> fix it up all right.” The matter tv as sent on to the Finance Committee for n report-.

TH K RETURN ’I'O SANITY. •Are British workers recoverin'!; that industrial reasonableness which chaiaeterised their pro-w mi «tc tiv itit?s They are,” writes Mr W. G. Appleton.' secretary of the General Federation of Trade Unions, in the " Meekly Dispatch.” “ Anyone moving among the so-called rank and tile discovers abundant evidence of changed opinions and wiser outlooks. Men and women are still, as always, moved hy rhetoric; tales of suffering, of evil conditions, or of unjustifiable oppressions still move them to compassion or anger, hut their present attitude is towards the flowers of sense rather than those ol thoughtless or interested oratory. During the recent period of economic madness the people have been deceived by demaoo.de plausibility, and consequently have endured, and are enduring, sad experiences.”

LATENT WORLD MARKETS. “ If the consumption of textile goods by India and China were doubled, present world capacity to meet the demand would be altogether inadequate. | If the populations of China. India, and Africa used cycles and motor-ears to the extent they are used in Great Britain. the world manufacture would need to expand a hundredfold. To increase the purchasing power ol the vast populations of the so-called backward countries' is the way to restore prosperity lo the depressed manufacturing industries. As these 1 markets develop there will he a world scramble for them, and those countries will got them which apply technical skill and scientific process. and utilise the newlv discovered electrical and chemical processes.”—Mr Philip Snowden.

THE PLYING ACE. i A majority of the men and women over forty who can afford to fly have never conquered the hesitation which was naturally aroused in the early, dangerous days of this century, said Sir Alan Coblmm, in a “ Daily Herald ” interview, ” hut a younger generation is growing up wlneli will regard living as their elders now regard motoring. To them the air will have no terrors, for flying will, within the next few years, become one of the commonplaces of our daily life. M e must provide more landing-places in the environs of all our great towns. Indeed, not only every town, but every village must have its own aerodrome.”

MID-LTFE AND THE CLOSED MIND •• mid-life advances, the tendency is for the mind to get set so that it refuses to welcome new ideas. The further some people travel from the past the more they glorify the past, with the result that the views and opinions held in a former day become almost a gospel to them. Any new idea is heretical, all change is retrogression. They view with suspicion any departure from the accustomed order or procedure. There is nothing that sets the stamp of age so visibly upon anyone as tliis.” —The. Rev. Edith E. Pipkies, of Stanley, in tjhe “Liverpool Congregational Magazine. •’

A HEADMASTER’S VIEW. “ Anything which tends to damage the life of the whole or to do harm to the community, however lightly it may touch any particular one ol us. that thing is our business and should not lie taken lying down. It that is true of life iti a small community, i: is true also of life in a larger sense. Things are always going on around us that make life more unworthy and more un-Christian. It is impossible to read one’s daily newspaper without reading examples of things happening which ought not to happen. We read of dishonesty in polities, dishonesty in business .or the oppression of defenceless people or the infliction of needless suffering on animals. It is possible for us to realise these thing and to say, ‘ V hat a pity, hilt what has it to do with me? 1 am not oppressing anybody. lam not dishonest in my business or in my polities. I am not causing needless suffering to animals.’ That is what the looker-on says. But the doer says, ■lt has everything to do with me! ’ The man who is playing the game of life is the one who refuses to take things lying down.”—Air Maurice L. Jacks. Headmaster of Mill Hill School, in a speech reported in the “Sunday School Chronicle.”

PERSONALITY. “ The world was need of leaders. In every country people were calling for a leader. A leader was deiined as a personality whom men would follow, and he needed idealism to enable him to see beyond ordinary men. to behold something ol the ordinary man did not see,” said Viscount llyng in a speech reported in the " Oxlord ( hroniele.

It needed magnetism to draw ordinary men to him. and the power ol command. He did not mean that in the drill-sergeant way. He meant that he was a person who could get wluit he wanted done, and in a iriendly. sympathetic way. The meaning of personality had mystified philosophers for about twenty-five centuries. It could not tie cut up into emotion, the mind, or the spirit. hut it was the biggest reality that was ever thought of. It showed itself in will, that element which gave units* to the consciousness and held together all one’s ideas and thoughts. The opposite of personality was their dear old friend the stereotyped. M’hat thov had to do was to keep personality, as against the stereotype.”

A CURIOUS THING. | •■From the dental point of view nothing is more essential tor ensni mg strong healthy teeth than suitable diet for Hie child ■ from its birth to maturity. T am convinced that the most useful correctives we have to mortem cooking are fruit- and salads, and that they are not as freely consumer! in tms country as they ought to he. On the Continent they form the termination of almost every meal, and the more simple the dressing the more beneficial they are. The consumption of limit has for years been advocated by the medical and dental professions, and lias received a groat deni of attention in the

Press. But what strikes me as curious is that the more fruit is advocated the dearer it apparently becomes. AYhv should not the fruit grower and dealer show the same spirit of altruism as the professional man?”—Professor M r . H. Gilmour, President of the British Dental Association.