Current Comment

Southern Cross, Volume 1, Issue 11, 10 June 1893, Page 12

Current Comment

(By Touchstone.)

So, Mr Carnegie, - the millionaire, ; predicts a unionjsof 'English-speaking' : races and the abolition of war. Both , arc consummations devoutly to be wished. Let us hope our latest prophet will do all he can to hasten them. If ho only prevents a repetition of the* terrible scenes witnessed in connection with his- works at Pittsburg last year it will be something gained. ■ Another effort to make people good by Act of /Parliament. An ordinance is being passed in Fiji to arhend the law relating to the slander of women. Under this proposed legislation gossips will have to be exceedingly careful as to how they let their tongues wag, especially when the characters of their neighbours are under consideration. ■ One correspondent of the local press feelingly points out that “ half ■ the women of Suva will be debarred from their favourite topic of conversation, and also wishes to know why masculine virtue is not to.be protected in a similar manner.” Two women graduates have gained the Modern Languages Tripos at Cambridge. No awards were made to men. Poor fellows ! They’re nowhere nowadays. Rocking the cradle at home while Angelina, 8.A., is seeking additional academical honours will be the chief function of the future husband.

Mr Gr. F. Richardson, member for Matanra, is in the peculiar position of being “ out of touch ” with several sections of his constituency regarding railway matters. He won’t countenance the Seaward Bush railway, and when questioned at Grore on Wednesday night re the extension of the Forest Hill line he replied that “it was not one that any business man or company would face though they got the tramway and plant already made and therefore it could not be exjoected to be taken in hand by the Government.” What will the Hedgehope people say to this P

As a rule one does not look to reports of borough council meetings for an3'thing of a mysterious nature, but curious people will certainly want to k®ow what is meant by the following —-At the last meeting of the Invercargill Council Professor Black submitted his report re water, supply. — The Mayor said he wnuld take upon his own shoulders the onus of suppressing the report in the meantime. He did so for the benefit of the ratepayers and the town, and when the councillors perused the report he was sure they would endorse his action. — It was decided to refer the document to the Gas and Water Committee for report. —This is a big disappointment. For months the ratepayers have been looking forward to the Professor’s report, and now when it does come it is apparently, although of course not in an evil sense, “ unfit for publication,” as the newspapers say. We can only console ourselves with the reflection that there can be nothing very deadly E'about the water, otherwise His Worship would have let the cat, or rather the Professor, out of the bag.

Not to be tolerated in any shape—not even in wax. A model in wax, representing the notorious murderer Deeming in the act of burying his victim under the heartstone in the cottage at Windsor, having been imported by some person unknown and left on the wharf, was lately taken possession of by the Victorian Customs Department. The secretary of the Customs Department intends to Lave it destroyed. There are some things people cannot forget too soon, and in this category may be placed Deeming’s horrible crimes. A Melbourne paper lately recorded the fact that a poor old couple, unable'

any longer to fight the, battle .of - life, walked hand and hand into a river and were drowned., .The same paper also mentioned ‘ that Lord Iveagh is the richest man in Britain, .with a fortune amounting to £14,000,000. The two extremes in life seldom come into such striking' contrast, do they ?

Cooks, like musicians, are touchy people. As an item of London gossip the correspondent of an exchange lately mentioned that the cook at the Reform Club had resigned. His-salary was £320 a year. Pew chefs ■ earn more than that sum, although I have' heard of £SOO being paid. This is a sad falling off from the days of Francatelli, Udes, Soyer, and such masters. Udes, if I recollect right, was cook to a former Earl of Sefton. He resigned because he one day saw one oh the young Molyneux’s putting salt in the soup which had just "been handed to him. What has really demoralised the profession of cookery in London and lowered the male cook, financially, to the level of the civil sexwant -or the country rector, is, in the first place, the establishment of so many schools of cookery, which turn out excellent women cooks. Some of the best paid cooks in London nowadays are women.

Sir Robert Stout is now the member for Inangahua, having given his plucky young opponent a tremendous thrashing’. This ■was only to be expected when the combatants were so unequally matched. How that Sir Robert has got a seat the question arises—“ What will he do with it ?” It is hardly likely that he will take up the position of "a private member. On the , other hand if he accepts office in the Ministerial ranks he is scarcely likely to take a subordinate office.