RANDOM REMARKS.

King Country Chronicle, Volume III, Issue 120, 7 January 1909, Page 2

RANDOM REMARKS.

.. ♦ _ [Contributions to this column are always welcome from any part of the district. The Editor does not vouch for the authenticity of the stories, nor is he responsible for the criticisms.]

The weather has been playing scurvy tricks of late and almost spoilt the holidays, for which we have every reason to feel aggrieved. However, bright sunshine and clear atmosphere after the holidays would in a measure have compensated, but even that has been denied, and our sense of injury is growing steadily larger. On top of all comes the announcement that Clement Wragge, the eminent meteorologist has landed in New Zealand, and promises to perpetrate a course of lectures. This is surely the last straw. Most people will remember that oit the occasion of his last visit Mr Wragge prognosticated a series of direful happenings, beginning with potato and ending with earthquakes. Whiß admitting that the weather proplfl

does not control the elements, fad V not personally responsible for the events recorded, it is much more comfortable to live without the dread of impending catastrophe.

Man is admittedly a "complex being, and certain species of him draw comfort, in this vale of tears, from peculiar sources. Scientists have from time immemorial devoted strenuous effort, and years of study in the endeavour to discover the elixir of life. Of late, that particular branch of the scientific cult has gone somewhat out of fashion-, but we are all familiarjwith the picture of the hoary alchemist of the middle ages, who brewed strange potions amid darkly mysterious surroundings, and were commonly supposed to be leagued with the powers, of evil. A new prophet has arisen in the shape of an Austrian scientist, who is actually congratulating mankind upon the fact that life is brief. The recent earthquake was the means of the pessimistic opinion from the scientist in question that the earthquakes were merely the indications of a gen- - eral break-up of the planet, and 'man was to be congratulated on the brevity of his mortal span. Job's comforters are not seldom met with, but our Austrian friend must surely hold die record.