CURRENT TOPICS

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 393, 19 May 1910, Page 4

CURRENT TOPICS

THE WINTER OF OUR DISCONTENT. We publish a letter by "a caaual visi tor" this ,morning, and, as every won he -writes is the deadly earnest trutl 'we ask that it may be carefully per used. Everyone not a fanner is read; to accuse the straggler on tilie land o being a persistent growler. The pave jinent person who desires to know wlia claim the back-country has on the pub lie money for improvements would a i the present time be able to get a ver; fine ofbject lesson in the backblocks o Taranaki. If the town person make the trip lie should take several fathom of rope, a collapsible boat, a sledge wriJ ■broad runners, and other apparatus fo preventing him sinking under the mud Formerly there was a very elficlen Roads Department operating in Taranak: and as it specialised in roads and had no thing to do with railways it achieve* ! great and good work. la convparisoi with other public works, roadmakin: and mending and 'bridge-building am maintaining are beyond compare th most important. Retrenchment came and the Roads Department was absorbei into the Public Works Department. A a consequence, the (backblocks settle and his wife are being absorbed inti the mud. Borrowed money " saved by not looking after roads (b; which comes the produce to pa; the interest) represents the wors »{ bad business. There is nothing ii New Zealand half ;So important as th I settlement of land and the ingress am egress from and to it. Retrenching ii the matter of roads is very like "sav ing" property by setting fire to it. I comfortable servants to State wouli really believe that some women in Tara naki's hinterland do not see their km< for five or seven months at a stretcli and that a case actually happened wlier a woman was blindfolded before sh could be induced to face the horrors o the roadless country, they might con elude that the "growls" were justified At present the amalgamated Public Works Department is making a special ity of railways. In ipoint of importance the railway is not a circumstance ti the roads, for a railway is not much us< if roads do not lead to it. THE PEOPLE'S POOD. News from New South Wales states Uha a ibutoher has been fined for smoking ii his own meat shop. A bye-law prohib iting persons from smoking operate! in his town, and the butcher was om of its victims. In New ZeaJland, al though we believe we are most advanced we have much to learn from outsider; as to the treatment of food, and al though we have laws prohibiting per sons from doing many insanitary ant unhygienic acts, breaches of cleanlines are of daily occurrence. In many town of New Zealand butchers' meat is drivei through dusty streets uncovered, and ai newly killed meat attracts every forn of filth and germ almost as readily a: milk, this is a matter that requires se vere handling. The exposure of meat ii i open shops, especially those in bus; thoroughfares, is a common circum stance in any New Zealand city. Every body knows that milk is often about o: dirty railway platforms for many hour every day all through the year, tha when it leaves the hands of the farme it is execrably treated, and that man; retailers have no idea or wish to giv their customers a clean product. Brea is often -taken hot from the 'bakery ancarted around like so much refuse, liar died by all and sundry, and treated a if it were road metal. Fish, as treate by many vendors, is in the same cate gory. We believe that the general treal ment of food in New Zealand is not du to wilful disregard of the laws of liealtl but ignorance of them. No person wh is ignorant of the simple laws of con: mon cleanliness should ibe allowed t purvey food to the people. The pulbli is absolutely at the mercy of the ver dors, as is shown by a case cabled froi America on Monday. Many people ha been poisoned 'by arsenical "ice-cream, but their friends did not know it unt the vendor was traced by an acciden And we recall the circumstance where recent outbreak of typhoid fever wa clue to infected milk, all the cases o< curring on one round. There was, how ever, no trial for manslaughter of th vendor, although many people died. An lie, poor fellow, was probably quite if norantly cheerful while sowing deat and destruction from his cart. THE POWELKA DEFENCE. Some good people in the South ar scandalised at the movement in som parts of Manawaitu to get up a defenc fund for Powelka, who is reported tin able to fee -the legal talent lie undoubt edly requires for 'his defence. Thes people carry the mind back to the dav when an accusation was regarded as th sentence of a judge after conviction by 1 jury. Tihey have forgotten the awtfu things -that have 'happened to accusei persons because there was no one t befriend them. In -the absence of a dc fending counsel Gooke could tell ; trembling woman in the dock before hir that she was a diabolical criminal, 'an that all through the trial. At Yor! it was possible 'to hang a man in a cas of mistaken identity—as clearly provei after his execution—for there' was 11 counsel to insist on evidence be-in sought from the town where the accus ed said he belonged, and from which h had just come. To the cruel system o allowing undefended prisoners to be at t*c!ked by all the sharpest wit at th command of the profession, we owe tli pathetic complaint of Elizabeth fiatni against the "furious judge" who • ha< with iliis two colleagues overborne ho plea that the testimony of an interest!" witness sought not, uncorroborated, ti send her to the flames. It adds to <th pathos that the words stand part of th pa-ay erful attempt of a simple 'iod-.fpar ing old- woman to reconcile her soul ti flie awful fate beore -her. She was writ ing of resignation and such things whei the flames of the morrow roared acros: her cell and forced her shuddering noi •into talk of the "ferocious judire.""' i are more humane nowadays. But then is no hope for a man undefended—at al events none in comparison with liis state under the wing of counsel. If we dc not subscribe to the Powelka fund let u.' be silent at all events, if there is 110 thing of the wild beast in us.