The Daily News. SATURDAY, DECEMBER 24. CHRISTMAS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 219, 24 December 1910, Page 4

The Daily News. SATURDAY, DECEMBER 24. CHRISTMAS.

Christmas time keeps the world young for the aged and brightens it for the young. It makes the temporary cessation of necessary toil a boon, and in the pleasant intermission gives us time to search in the "book and volume of the brain" for kind thoughts. It is a season that lifts the hands of friends to kind deeds, that draws the curtain of the year over the blotted pages of life, that keeps good resolve and strikes a blow at evil. Christmas in its inevitability reminds human beings that the highway of the years is passing rapidly in the rear and that "there is so much to do, so little done." It is hope-time as well as thought-time—and most healthy people live in the present—"let the dead past bury its dead" and the future take care of itself. From hungry beginnings, Christmas has by development become a time of festival, for somehow human beings, old and young, civilised or savage, demonstrate joy by extra feeding. It ''is not necessary that we shall eat more food to-morrow that yesterday, but we do so because to-morrow is Christmas, and people always eat more food on December 25 than on December 24. Christmas is home-day, and is a sad spot in the year to him whose roof-tree is his hat, and who drinks in silence and alone the toast of the absent ones. Christmas is the cement that binds the complements of the home together, the magnet that attracts its particles—the unifier. As a beneficient collector, the work of Christmas laughs aloud from every railway platform, on every boat, on e,very country road and city street. As a lightning change artist Christmas is inimitable, and, old as the festival is, it is ever new in its variety and charm. It makes exchanges of country folk and city folk, transplants feet from pavement to paddock, from office to farm, from backcountry to seaside. It gathers the children in the castle of romance where the spirit of the old Prince of Christmas, Santa Claus, becomes enshrined in the hearts of the fathers and mothers. It is a time for "getting off the chain," and of forgetting that there ever was a chain, and if there was, that it was made of anything but gold.i Christmas is full of the dear delights that do not stale with the years or surfeit with the passing of centuries. Just as trains nowadays rush joyous freights of vivacious folk to thousands of homes, so used slow coaches to drag their loads by perilous ways to the festival. If Christmas is a time of self-indulgence (and who denies it?), it is also a time when one may indulge others. In January the commercial community will negin to make preparations to catch tie Christmas trade of 19M, for "when the heart bubbles it bursts the purse-strings," as a famous Irishman ouce remarked. The .conventionality of giving is fractured more often at Christmas time than at any other time. The value of a gift is guaged by the gladness of the giver and the joy of the receiver, and the gift of Christmas is the inspiration for all givers. In temporary cessation from the round of toil there is time to think of those whose toil is ceaseless, or those who would toil if there were work to be done, and so, at exery Christmas time the poor, the sick and the sorrowful are asked to forget their sorrow and their poverty for a day and to feel that they are peers of the healthy and were fed. Spasmodic efforts to alleviate distress are better than no efforts at all, and Christmas charities are good salves to the consciences that forget there is poverty and sickness during eleven months of the year. The bulk .of the people of the Christian world—a small proportion of humanity, when all is said and Christmas time the season of holiday, and, in order that holidays may not be marred, a .proportion go without any.' But the holiday spirit infects alike the pleasure-seekers and those who cater for them, and everybody agrees that Christmas time is children's time, when harmless and pretty makebelieves lighten the way, and when it is sacrilege to tell the exact. truth about "Father Christmas." If Christmas makes us feel young, if "joy is unrestrained," if the well-fed don't overfeed and the hungry are filled, if your gladness is in giving pleasure to others, thank Providence for Christmas! Christmas rounds off the angle of the year, tells us that time Ls fleeting, that life is short. We may be. younger in heart this Christmas than last Christmas. It all depends on the way we have treated the other fellow. To all our readers we wish A MERRY CHRISTMAS.

ing ill-selected her partner, or, as often Happened, for her partner having been ill-selected for her. Marriage, according to eugenics, was a privileged, yet terminable contract, one of supreme moral, spiritual and social value, not an indissoluble bond. Restrictions of marriage should be based, not on decrees of general councils of the Church, but on known laws of health and human progress. These laws, once ascertained, should be as binding on the conscience as the decalogue. Marriage should not be entered on unless there were present soundness of body, saneness of mind, and unity of spirit.

A PROTECTIVE .SOCIETY. There exists in New Zealand a Society which is doing magnificent wonk. The Society for the Protection of Women and Children is one that does an almost unknown quantity of good. The Christchurch 'branch has applied for a Government subsidy to help it carry on its work, and it is hoped the application will be successful. It would surprise many people to attend the office of a secretary of one of the branches in a New Zealand city and to note the number of women (and men) who bring troubles to the Society. ■ In the twelve years during which the Society has existed in New Zealand it has handled thousands of cases, and all ■without unnecessary publicity. It is a "half-way house" between destitution and State charitable aid; it simplifies and minimises the necessity for appealing to State authorities; and its work is quiet, unseetarian and honestly inquisitive.. The Society, as we have . found by personal examination, carefully, investigates every complaint made, so that imposition is infrequent.; It has been .chiefly useful in helping women and children deserted by the alleged "bread-winner;" If the amended Destitute Persons Act is as successful as one hopes, this splendid Society will have its arduous work simplified. The secretary of the largest branch in New Zealand once told us that the people of the Dominion had no conception of the real facts of the case, and that few women who appealed to the Society for protection were disposed to disclose the full extent of their misery. The difficulty of proving in court neglect of and cruelty to children is very great, and therefore it is difficult to grant the relief that would be available if it were possible to sheet home charges of neglect. The recently reported case of gross cruelty to a "boarded out" child is but a sample of common occurrence. If the Government can by any means help the Society for the Protection of Women and Children to extend its scope and influence such help would have good results to the whole community.

RAILWAY RETURNS. The rapidity with which the North Island is outstripping the South Island is demonstrated,by a perusal of the railway traffic statistics published in last week's Gazette. The total revenue derived from the North Island lines al, ready, durjng the current financial year, is £1,010,908, and, as regards the South i Island lines, the aggregate revenue amounts to only £999,455. The significance of the figures will be more reai when it is remembered that the South Island has an advantage of 438 miles in regard to the total length of open lines. In the matter of expenditure, the South Island appears in a poorer light, the percentage of expenditure to revenue on the basis, of a twelve-monthly period being 69.09, as against 68.37 in the .North Island. An examination of the figures for 1909 shows that up to the corresponding . period of that year, the total revenue for ,the South Island lines waa £956,3135, whilst the receipts in connection witli the North Island lines were only £898,468. In this connection it should be noted also that the percentage of exI penditure to revenue at that time was higher in the North Island than in the South Island. As regards the North Isj land the percentage was 74.11, whereas in the South Island it was 70.97. Taking the figures for the four weeks ending November 12 alone, they show the revenue to be:—North Island, £86,998; South Island, £86>668. As showing the more rapid strides which the North Island lines are making, the figures for the corresponding four-weekly period should also be quoted. They are: Receipts, North Island, £117,887; South Island, £111,651. Expenditure: North Island, £80,437; South Island, £82,880.