"THE MAIL'S" LETTER FROM LONDON

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXIII, 23 July 1929, Page 7

"THE MAIL'S" LETTER FROM LONDON

LONDON, 6th June. Election excitement in town lias subsided (ilmost as abruptly as it aroseafter tlie first, sensational breakaway from the Tories. Tho levelling-up process which set in wilh the arrival of county, results speedily brought about a waning of enthusiasm, and now everybody appears to be suffering severely 'from reaction. On all sides now the tendency is to count the. costs, and naturally nobody is pleased with the reflections that occupation engenders. The Socialists, though they have, gained an unquestionable victory, aro no longer expressing jubilation. The reason is' that they now realise that, with tho majority'the Conservatives had ill the hist Parliament, jfc was inconceivable that the landslide could have 'been'of such dimensions as to bring real power inlo their hands. If such, therefore, arc the lack lustre feci-' in'gs of tho victors, it 15 easy to conceive with what bitterness are th c vanquished reviewing events. ELECTORAL REFORM One thing seems pretty well agreed as tho result of the recent' election. An examination of the voting figures shows that some reform of our electoral system is almost imperative. Labour, with nearly 250,000 fewer votes, holds 33 more seals than the Conservatives, and the Liberals, with.nearly two-thirds of

AFTER THE ELECTION COMMENT ON CURRENT EVENTS' SOCIAL AND POLITICAL DOINGS (From,. Our Own Correspondent,)

the Conservative total poll, have about oncTifth of the representation in the new .Parliament. It may bo that only proportional representation or some similar'device, will enable the country to escape from (ho expensive impasse of clec< (oral stalemate. TALKING ROUND THE WORLD Impressive confidence evidently exists at the CI. P.O. in the future, of longdistance wireless tolephouy, because the Government's engineering experts are busy carrying out extensive additions to the Rugby high power station. If there is no immediate necessity for this new equipment for growing trans-Atlantic calls tile facilities arc to be put. to excellent Imperial use. Important experiments will be made with a view lo extending wireless telephony to South Africa, India- and Australia direct. Beam telegraphic services are already working to these distant places, but the beam system may not be adopted for telephone purposes, too. •'Another Post Office project now in hand is the establishment of wireless telephony between this country and South America. This would bo a bi'g help to thc trade development now being stimulated. LORD D'ABERNON Thc public perhaps hardly realises how finely it is still being served, if nof

by the party politicians, at mast by ! distinguished public servants. Take Jjie ' ease of Lord D'Abernon, who has consented to lake charge cf the Board of ' Trade's Economic Slission ' to South ' America. Not only has this handsome . nobleman already' performed long service for the country, from being Lord Milncr's successor as Financial Advisor to the Egyptian Government to postwar Ambassador in Berlin, but 'he is now in his 72nd year, and litoVit men,' j with his enthusiasm for sport and art, j would bo more disposed to take a wlj- j earned rest from public affairs. As Sir j Edgar Vincent he was M.P. for Exeter i during six years, while his brother, Sir I Howard, sat for Sheffield. I believe) Lord D'Abernon, who talks French, ■ German, and Creek, is the best linguist j in Debrctt. LAST GOAL-FIRED CRUISER An order lias just been issued far paying off the hist, coal-fired cruiser in tho Royal Navy. This is the Lowes- • toft, on the Africa station, which is to return to Dovonport by 27th August to pay off for disposal. The oil-burning cruiser Carlisle will succeed her. For long the Africa station was the only • one upon which mil-fired ships were retained, no doubt, as ;i concession .to the j local mines. Some years before South Africa started a naval service of her ' : own the Government of Natal provided 12,000 tons of coal annually free of charge, for the use of the Royal Navy. But 'gradually all tho Coal ships have been withdrawn, the most recent being tho Birmingham, famous as the vessel which, when in tho Grand Fleet, destroyed the fiust submarine in the war. J She has been replaced by the Calcutta. '• Were it not for tho war-built sloops, c'f which four are in African waters, designed for coal as a matter of expediency, there would be hardly a coalburning ship now left in commission - in thc navy. j LONDON'S TOWN HALL !, Though the City Corporation is about lo consider the o'jl question of London's

somewhat inadequate Town Hall, because, that is what tlio Mansion Houso really is, it is hardly likely that the drastic step will he taken of removing it elsewhere. It is nearly two centuries old, and, apart -from being antiquated, begins to lie "dwarfed" by its neighbours. The new Bank of England will look down on it, for instance, and other commercial buildings around arc in like position. The choice seems to be between realising the site value, which must ho prodigious, and building a new Mansion .House elsewhere, and spending £50,000 on bringing the existing edifice ■ up-to-date. The latter is, considering i the problem of finding a new site and j the cherished associations of the. pres- ! cut one, the more likely course. SIR lIAMAH Sir llamar Greenwood, who at 59 is retiring from the active Parliamentary arena, was Canadian born. But his father was an Englishman who practised us a. lawyer in the Dominion, and his mother descended from United States settlers who trekked across the Canadian border rather than forfeit tho aegis of lii'iiiNi! nag when the Declaration of Independence took place. Sir llamar mi-.-kiw;itiil at Toronto University, and, after joining the Canadian Militia mid qualifying for a commission, founded the King's Colonial Yeomanry. His courage was severely tried, but never found wanting, during the time he was Irish Secretary, when tho Black and Tans were worrying (lie Republican gunmen. This episode was the reason why Sir Harnar, after he ceased to be a Minister, had tho distinction of being the only back-bench M.P. with a Scotlaud laid escort. FALSE ALARM An old army friend of mine was the unwitting cause, on ono occasion, of badly scaring Sir Hamar's police escort. He called to see me in Fleet-street, about the time that things were at their worst "over there" and accompanied me to Whitehall, where,l had a call to make at the Irish Office. In those days that was a formality. You

were interrogated through barred portals, and the door slammed tho moment you were nilclfel' the lintel. 1 asked my friend to wait a few minutes till 1 came out. But as he paced up and down, up dashed Sir Hamar's car, and tho piairi clothes man beside the chauffeur promptly spotted "a mysterious stranger," bronzed and adventurous-looking, who seemed to be waiting especially-out-sido tho Irish Secretary's office. At once tho car drove off at a tremendous pace, and my harmless old army churn, who realised the situation, was left chuckling. EARL MARSHAL COMES OF AGE The 16th Duko of Norfolk, Earl of Arundel, Surrey, and Norfolk, baron Fitz Alan, Clun, Ovswaldestre, and Maliravers. Earl Marshal and Hereditary Marshal of England, Premier, Duke and Earl—it sounds like a page from Mallory's "Morte d'Arthur" ! —entered upon his heritage last week. A goodly heritage- it is, including Arundel Castle in Sussox, Beech Hill, Sheffield, and Norfolk House in London. His grace has been a subaltern in the Royal I Horse Guards, and is heir to yet another barony—that of his mother, who lis sue juro Baroness Hcrries. It was a ! coincidence that Jiis coming of ago , should synchronise with polling day. It means he must set about preparing for the performance of his duties as Earl Marshal—duties which for the past twelve years have been performed bv his uncle Viscount Fitz Alan. Tim Earl Marshal takes a prominent part in the State Opening of Parliament, and has io act as guide, philosopher and friend to newly-created peers on their introduction in the House of Lords. Doubtless tho gorgeous' apparel of scarlet and gold, -worn ou those occasions, hae already been prepared by the ducal tailor. A BISHOP AT HOME Dr. Gwynne, who has been explaining when and where ho is to be found in his vast diocese of Egypt and the Sudan was probably tho best known Padre in the War. Lord Kitchener remembered him as a missionary from the days of Omdurman. So when an acting chaplaiugcuerai was wanted for the Western Front, he thought of the bishop, who thus came into direct contact with every regiment in the British Army in France and Flanders. When he is at Khartoum .in the Winter—which is just like a dry English Summer, by the way—ho is usually- sitting in the hall of the "Padre House' of an evening, "at home" to officers .from tho British Garrison who may come in to exchange reminiscences of battles of long ago. Or earlier, he maybe met on the tennis-courts cf the Sudan Club, where his half-cut is very baffling. The bishop is a genial soul, and as much a persona grata with tho black population as with the while. FRIEND OF HUMANITY .' I hope the recent appeal on behalf of 'Sir Ronald Ross proved in its results adequately commensurate to the colonel's lifework. It would be a' public reproach if a soldier, really more illustrious than most who have been honoured with titles and princely, votes, and who had literally saved millions of lives, sho-uld remain a poor man at the close of his days. Ho is now 71, and it is 37 years ago since ,he began to specialise in malaria and. its parasites, which formerly made huge tropical tracts of the glob'o death-traps. Thanks solely to his devoted genius, the malaria scourge to-day is practically extinct, and the Panama. Canal is only one of his monuments. His distinctions include the Nobel Prize it? 1902, and the Albert Medal in 1923' Besides his medical laurels Sir Ronald' has distinctions as poet .and mathematician. A LITERARY "CARD" Mr Arnold Bennett celebrated his 62nd birthday last week, but no one could, as th e y )( say at the police court, "tell it on him. ' Time was when middle-age seemed to bo getting hold of the Historian of the Potteries, but he rejuvenated himself by a drastic regime, mainly dietary and fruitarian, which ho has enthusiastically expounded. He is-as-avid of life as any youngster, savours.it with infinitely more judgment, and his output is amazing. About a million words per annum—and Mr Arnold Bennett's words are highly paid for; His.rapid workmanship may be gauged by on e example. At one time he lived a Jekyll-and-Hyde sort of literary life, writing serious novels for his reputation and potboilers for a living. The pot-boilers he composed mainly between his railway station and his study, and what po+ boilers! I should say < 'The Hotel Babylon' is the. best "thriller" ever written. PAID TO KEEP MOSQUITOES There is a small farmer living on the Isle of Grain, the marshland just South iiast of Chatham, who makes a -steady if adventitious income by breeding mosquitoes. The Ministry of Health is much interested in mosquitoes and their carrying powers, and requires a steady supply for experimental purposes. About once a fortnight Ministry doctors motor down to Gram, and call upon this farmer it he can show them a pig-sty with a pie-' m it, he gets ten shillings. Th e reason is that.the presence of a pigTn its sty provides the necessary "central heating" which the mosquito requires ,for com-fortable-living. If the pig is there, the : mside of the sty is always well lined with mosquitoes. As many as a thousand are collected in twenty minutes. FIRST GOLF. CLUB The announcement that the Royal Blackheath Golf Club's remodelled course —now at Eltham, and not at Blackheath —is to be officially opened on 15th June, reminds one that this i s the oldest club m the world devoted to the Royal and Ancient game. It was instituted in 1608. Scotland is tho homo of golf, but the first Scottish club, the Edinburgh Burgess Golfing Society, did not come into existence until 127 years later. The famous SI. Andrews club, which still more or. less controls-the destinies of the gamp was formed in 1754, and nine clubs were in existence in Scotland beforo the 18th century began. England's second oldest club is Old Manchester, instituted in 1818.