Newspaper Notions

Free Lance, Volume II, Issue 67, 12 October 1901, Page 6

Newspaper Notions

THE task of the British Ai my m Afnca seems to us \ery like that of a woman looking for fleas in a blanket.- -Levin 'Faimer" » * * They want their Shakespeaie in New Zealand sandwiched in between vaudeville and musical corned} — Sydney "Newsletter." T* * VWe are called the backbone of the country, but what is the good of a backbone with the marrow sucked out of if s> — Templeton ' Farmer." • • • Mr. Fowlds can't get the Government to take up his Cycle Roads Bill. In fact, the wheels won't go round — Ciomwell 'Argus." * # * The Go\ ernrai nt can now no more cease to borrow money than they can cease to be extravagant, and whether for a brief or an extended period we can only await the climax. — North Otago ' Times." * * * The State would be performing an important act of self-defence if — poui encourager les autres — it hanged on a soui apple tree a few score of chemi&ts, some odd medical practitioners, and a goodh peicentage of the horde of unclean quacks, of both sexes, who aie stnking at the sanctity and stability of family life, and, in it, at the moral and mateilal well-being of our country. — Dunedm "Tablet" on declining birth rate • • • When artificers and labourers aie walking the stieets, will the decisions of the Arbitration Court be then maintained will they be submitted to? What stomach will the men have in the "winter of their discontent" foi going into the Labour Courts to fight for high wages when they cannot obtain wages of any kind whatever — Tuapeka "Times."

The Defence Department us badly m want of an insecticide It is ovei-iun with returned contmgonteis Cannot the State start a poultiy taim for the benefit of its heroes ? — Mastoiton" Stai." * » • At the present, lnonienb New Zealand piesents an object lesson both m piogiessive politics and in labour legislation. It lias shown the woild not what to imitate, but what to a\ oid --Glasgow "Herald."^ If the plague or smallpox invaded South Austiaha to-monow, e\ en inothei's son of those Ms P who aie blowing against vaccination would msli the doctois' offices to get some "cow" into themselves — Ade'aide "Quiz " As for the Upper House that has been a lefuge foi i expectable old dn elects long enough, and should eithei be abolished altogether or reformed by sweeping out all the ancient lehcs over sixty years of age. — Hastings ''Bulletin " * * * Premier Seddon is said to be vv carving of the dcmnition gnnd of politics, and p>eop'e are talking of his being made Governor of the Orange Rner Colom, in South Africa, after the Coronation Dick would be a good stiong man to turn loose on the Boers — Melbourne "Punch." » # * The Government aie about to bring in a Bill to regulate the practice of dentistiy. At piesent the pulling out of teeth is such a profitable game that all sorts of amateurs are putting up biass plates — they have plenty of brass in their o\\ n composition to supp\> one for every door — and starting m to make money. — Adelaide 'Clitic " * * * Attempts ha\e been made to minimise the gravity of the statements of S\dney Tiuth" concerning juvenile immorality in the pnncipal Maonland centres But that Government has been compelled to introduce legislation bearing upon the subject is an ice-cold fact which will take more than a casual sneer 01 two to upset. — Chri-st church "Spectator." Barnum was a c'evei advertisei of himself and his show , and the system adopted by the Premiei , on any and every occasion which has offeied of doing the same for himself and New Zealand, suggests that he has closely studied the literature beaiing on the caieer of that remarkable man • — Waikato "Argus."

It always '.corns like a miracle to a man the wav a woman will manage a big hat, a lontr skirt, a bundle, and her lehgion m a high wind. — Sydney Tiuth." * # # Not only will it be made a penal offence to drink a glass of beer, but smoking by adults will be prohibited. Then we will have laws closing the theatios in the interests of public morality, then other laws malting church attendance compulsoiy, and finally the Millennium God Save the King 1 — Auckland 'Obsciver." If jou put a beggar on hoiseback he will ride to the devil," is an old saying which need not be accepted literally. AVhat applies to the beggar applies just as foicefullv to the shoddy democratic politician Place him in power, give him the means, and he will outshine the pomp and circumstance of recognised atistocrac-\ — Wanganui "Chronicle." * • ♦ The member for Here-and-there fixes Ins eagle eye on a ten pound use to a badh-paid official, and chokes with indignation. He will resist that ten pounds being spent with his last breath — but he will vote for fooling away a quaiter of a million of money to maintain that popular fetish, the co-opera-tivo labour movement , he strains at a miserable gnat — and swallows a whole diove of camels. — Wairarapa "Times " * * * Suiely the "most ach anced democracy amongst civilized communities" does not depend on any man — or any number of men — and that being so, what is there to hinder Mi. Seddon going Home and gaining all the honour and glorification so dear to his heait, and leave Sir Joseph Ward to 'urn the show" in his absence — ]ust as other New Zealand Premieis have done before — Greymouth Aigus." * * * Theie aie those who hold that a Wages Act- -and our Conciliation and Aibitiation Act, boiled down into plain English, is our Wages Act, and will ultimately become our Limitation of Wages Act- — does not manacle capital It takes a cleverei man than even the Premier to put 'the darbies" on capital. He may make it ''move on" — and so far, in doing this, he has benefited industiial enterprise at the expense of land enterprise In the next move he may "chivvy" it out of the colony to a gi eater extent than heretofore. — Masteiton ' Times."

If the party element were removed from, politics the House could do more work in one month than, it now does in four. — Lyttelton "Times." * # * One tiling is certain, so long as the appointments to our civil service are moie or less political gifts, the tendency will be to increase rather than diminish the number and scope of those anomalies. — Petone "Chronicle." * * * To what a contemptible degradation has journalism in the Northern City sunk when the Auckland editors indulge m such ridiculous and empty bombast! — Marlborough "Express" on Auckland "Star's" tirade against Wellington. * • • Tho Arbitration Court sends a number of men out of employment, as employers cannot afford to pay the wages fixed, and are consequently using more labour-saving machinery m order to protect themselves. — Palmerston North "Standard." * * » The mandate which the Government leceivpd from the country at the general election is still in force, and as long as it is so tho Premier has an undoubted right to demand from his fo l lowers an unswemng support on all questions of importance. — Tuapeka "Times." * * # A Colonial Treasurer, who is engaged in perpetual strife with the AuditorGeneral of the colony, creates more than a suspicion that there is a skeleton in the cupboard that will yet rattle its bones before the gaze of those who have to boar the brunt of all this reckless and extravagant administration The woist has not been levea^d. — North Otago "Times." * » * To use Auckland as a threat to the Government, \\ ithout the knowledge of the Auckland people, is a model of cheeky presumption which is more likely to cover the cause of cycle roads with ndicule than to frighten the Premier into a condition of nervous obedience and servility. — Auckland "Observer." * » » If the departmental expenditure is too great a strain for the revenue to bear, letrenchment should be resorted to. and if the Government of the countiy cannot be carried on by Messrs. Seddon and Co. at a reasonable cost by all means Jet the him of muddlers make way for abler men. — Palmerston "Standard."