The Sun 42 WYNDHAM STREET, AUCKLAND TUESDAY, AUGUST 27, 1929 NATIONAL VIGOUR

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 752, 27 August 1929, Page 8

The Sun 42 WYNDHAM STREET, AUCKLAND TUESDAY, AUGUST 27, 1929 NATIONAL VIGOUR

“JJETTEII one day as a lion than a hundred years as a sheep.” O This is the latest national motto adopted by Fascistic Italy and inscribed on its new coinage of 20-lira pieces. It is worth consideration even by countries which hate the idea of beingdragooned politically by a Dictator who has enjoyed more than one day as a lion and never has been a sheep. The aim of Italy’s currency ideal is to promote national vigour for the improvement of everyday activity by the nation and the development of “will-power which prepares for Fascism the conscious citizens of peace, the heroic soldiers of war. ’ So that all the people of Italy may render unto Mussolini the things that are Mussolini’s, the moral of the lion and the sheep has been reinforced by one of the Dictator’s characteristic declarations: “Courage, fearlessness, the love of risk, repugnance to a potbellied peaceful life, to be ever ready to dare in private as in public life, to abhor all that is sedentary.” Such is the lion’s roar, and not even the most irreconcilable enemy of Fascism could confuse it with the bleating of a sheep. So, after all, there are some laudable advantages in Fascism. Indeed, the rigorous practice of such idealism as is stamped upon a 20-lira piece is really an active and a widespread exercise of British tradition—the ideal which, in the passing of centuries, placed the sons of Great Britain foremost and highest in adventure, in sport, and in the building of the world’s greatest Empire. In short, what the British race has done well for years (allowing, of course, for occasional periods of slackness and apparent softness), the Italian people are now doing with sunny exuberance and with the pride that links itself to new achievements. Hence the prowess and high purpose of Italians in all kinds of vigorous sport and splendid adventure. As a remarkable feature of Italy’s new electoral law which permits the Fascist Grand Council to nominate a thousand Parliamentary candidates, sport was given deliberate representation in the original list. The time has not yet come, however, to determine the calibre and energy of any government by the simple process of electing representatives famed for their performances as airmen, explorers, skilled swordsmen and fencers, Alpine climbers, footballers, Marathon runners, horsemen and cricketers who, in particular, might not be welcome in polities for the reason that therein there is already too much .slow play and tedious stonewalling. But a great deal, obviously, could be said in favour of vitalising the work of Parliament by the introduction, on a generous scale, of record-breakers in vigorous sport. If sporting achievement and the love of sport were to he the supreme test of national vigour in all countries, doubtless New Zealand would stand high in the international roll of healthy pastimes and pleasures. But what is the Dominion’s position in regard to the higher tests of national vigour generally and, more particularly, in respect of Parliamentary energy and political service? It is to be feared that, today, this country does not occupy a high place on the international list. Are there many among our eighty representative politicians who would prefer one day as a lion to a hundred years as a sheep? Since indulgence in personalities is never appreciable except when it takes the form of fulsome flattery, Signor Mussolini’s crude reference to the rotundity of peaceful life need not he made applicable to politicians who have spent eight weeks and thousands of pounds on the poorest sort of political oratory, and have done nothing at all to earn their salaries. But, it is • perfectly fair to apply to them the national vigour test of “courage, fearlessness, the love of risk, readiness to dare in public life, and abhorrence of all that is sedentary.” So far, the Dominion’s Parliament has failed lamentably in meeting 1 such tests and still shows no signs of splendid activity and will-power for notable achievement. The lack of ideal national vigour, however, is not confined to the Government and the House of Representatives. It is manifest among many local bodies, except those few which believe that obstinacy is strength, and their work therefore is more conspicuous for the national vigour which is strongest in the expenditure of borrowed money. And can it he denied that there is a lack of national vigour in industry and enterprise? A NEW MODE IN TRAVEL THE exploits of the Graf Zeppelin set a new standard of measurements for world travel. In less than three weeks the airship has practically completed her trip round the globe. All that remains is the passage across America from Los Angeles to Lakehurst, and this should offer,no extreme difficulties. In the meantime the passengers on the pioneering craft have passed across many lands and over lonely seas that, for the air navigator, seem to hold little terror. Mountain ranges, arid deserts, lonely steppes and leagues of forest—all these barriers are of little account to travellers in the new and rapid mode, and if, in traversing the pathways of the Khans and the routes worn through hundreds and hundreds of years by laborious camel trains, the airship traveller loses some of the old thrill of world travel, and has no intimate association with the countries and peoples below, he at least has the compensation of speed and a new viewpoint. It is doubtful if speed alone will ever be permanent, compensation for the lost glamour of the older method; yet it is just as certain that from the flights of the Graf Zeppelin a new popularity of airship travel will arise, and there develops the bewildering possibility that, when the mode advances, it will he possible to see the world in the modern fashion in the course of a three weeks’ annual holiday. So far, the present flight of the Graf Zeppelin has even lacked the element of delay and danger which marred her first transatlantic venture. On that occasion contrary winds bore the craft far out of her course. Another misadventure occurred in May when, leaving Germany for a seeond Atlantic crossing, she was forced down in France with engine trouble. Yet, considering the mileage she has now flown, the trouble she has caused her navigators has been small, and the development of regular transatlantic and transcontinental air services in the Northern Hemisphere may be accepted as a matter of course. By the same token, efforts should be made to encourage air Travel in the Southern Hemisphere. Two years ago a delegation from the British Air Ministry visited New Zealand in the course of a world tour, and tentative sites for airship mooring-masts were then selected. By hastening the erection of such facilities as are necessary. New Zealand may share in the development of airship routes that will make a passage to Australia a mere matter of 30 hours’ travel. Except as it applies to popular interest, and not the “stunts” of pioneer flying men. such reductions of travelling time are. of course, nothing new. And remarkable though the recent feats of the Graf Zeppelin have been, credit must not be withheld from the British R 34, which pioneered the Atlantic crossing ten years ago.