CORRESPONDENCE.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXVII, Issue 1381, 1 April 1915, Page 3

CORRESPONDENCE.

(To the Editor)

Sir. —I notice in your issue of j the 30th ult. some comments on j a recent meeting of the Holiday ] Association by one signing himself “Interested.” Now, sir, I quite agree with those members — although they may have been a very small minority—who were opposed to the dosing of business premises from Thursday until the following Tuesday. The closing on Saturday would be unprecedented so fat as Foxton is concerned, and under present conditions, quite unnecessary and illadvised. Although we may not yet have experienced to the same extent that those in other lands are doing, the horrors of war, and the poverty, ruin and hardships that follows, yet we shomd not be hungering tor additional holidays and reckless mirth-making, while some of our own kith and kin are suffering on the battle field for us. i'bose in the dreary muddy trenches, away from all they bold dear, many of’them wounded and dying, are not having much of a holiday ; those keeping their ceaseless vigil on the lone North Sea, are not having much of a holiday, and those who went down with the Good Hope, Monmouth and other ships died tor us, and to ceaseless efforts of all these we owe the measure of our present prosperity. We do not know how long this will last. Others through helping us ate now paupers, who a lew months ago were perhaps more prosperous than we, and so it seems inadvisable as well as unseemly at the present time to spend our cash in reckless holiday making. It is very easy for your correspondent to bewail the hardness of his lot, because he cannot get an additional holiday, never before given in the history ol Foxton, and write to the paper about it like a spoiled child asking tor more jam cake. As for his phrases and assertions such as “wonderful one man dominated meeting,’' “this brave association,” ‘'good old Foxton,” etc., they are merely bombastic piffle. Although the Association may have done good work in the past, common sense would show that no sane business man would sign an agreement binding himself tor all time or for any stated time, allowing a majority of small men with equal voting power and whose interests were not identical to drive his business to a neighbouriug town. Does it follow sir, that because a majority of these men meet in solemn conclave and, carried away by some momenlry spasm, shall decide to close down business for a mouth to go fishing, that the minority, perhaps with bigger interests, should be compelled to close down 100. Vour correspondent signs himself “Interested.” Are not the public interested 100 . J Have they not any say as to when it is, or is not, convenient for them to make their purchases ? The men who were opposed to the a.dd'lionai day aie interested interested iu their business and in the convenience of the general public. Your correspondent evidently is interested only in drawing his pay and looking for extra holidays free. I'bose who are sensibly interested will appreciate their positions or the measure of public support they receive and not seek at the present juncture additional days of pleasure. —I am, etc.. IXTKRKSTKO Too.