CURRENT TOPICS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 331, 19 June 1911, Page 4

CURRENT TOPICS.

THE BLACK PAMPHLET. The Black bankruptcy lias had one useful effect.. It lias shown that the wretched pamphlet published nnU printed by Black was not "loaded" by politicians, or financed with Opposition money. Mr. Massey, it will he remembered, disclaimed any connection with the pamphlet. No one who had any knowledge of the Leader of the Opposition believed him capable of connection with it, but "if you throw plenty of mud, some of it sticks." It is gratifying, therefore, that the bankruptcy proceedings have placed the matter beyond question. It was not political party ammunition, and tnc period during which liarm might be done by dissemination of the slander has passed away. What misguided pamphleteers desire to achieve by such writings it is impossible to conceive, but it is shown that such things react on the perpetrators. It is cheering to have double conviction that if thqre were any liiianc'uil aiders and abettors tliev were not politicians, and that the influence of the poisonous pamphlet is now dead and buried.

111?. ROOSEVELT ON NEW ZEALAND. Commenting in the Outlook upon the work on "liacial Decay," recently published by .Mr. Bealc, of Sydney, Mr. Roosevelt says:—"'One of the stra"gest and saildest tilings in the whole sad business is that the decline has been most marked in the very places where one would expect to see the abounding vigor of the race most strikingly displayed. In Australia and New Zealand there is no warrant whatever in economic conditions for a limitation of the birth-rate, and the course of events in these great new countries demonstrates beyond possibility of refutation that the decline in the birth-rate is not due to economic forces, and has no relation whatsoever to hard conditions of living. New Zealand is as large na Great Britain and as fertile. Its population is between one-thirtieth and one-fortieth of that of Great Britain. Tt is composed of the sons and grandsons of the most enterprising and adventurous people in the Old Country, and the iSew Zealand people have realised to an extraordinary degree the institutional and industrial ambitions of democracy everywhere; yet the rate of natural increase in New Zealand is actually lower than in Great Britain, and has tended steadily tn decrease. The Australians are sparsely scatered over the fringe of the great island i-onif iticirl. It, is a. continent which could support, without the slightest difficulty, tenfold the present population, and at the same time raise the general standard of well-being. Net it* sparse population tends to concentrate in great cities of disproportionate, size compared to the country population, just as is the

case in England and the United States, ajid in so many of the countries of Europe; and it mennses ?.o slowly that, even if the present rate were maintained, the population would lint, double itself ill the next century; while, it the rate of decreaso of the last decade continue, the population will nave become stationary by the middle of the century, ff this is so, then the men who rally to the battle-cry of 'A White Australia' have indeed ground for anxiety as they think of the teeming myriads steadily increasing north of them in Asia. In private life no man cam permanently hold land of which he maken no use, and in the life of -nations it iH absolutely certain that in the end no .race can hold a territory save on condition of developing and populating it."

ARBOR DAY. If everybody knew and felt the value of trees, Arbor Day woiiiu bo hailed as one of the most important working festivals of the year. New Zealand has in tne past scorned trees bocause she has liad to fight them. Trees are as necessary as air and light, rain, frost, snow and land. Trees are a part of nature's great plan, an inexhaustible source of distillation, conservation, soil enrichment, and one of tne most necessary elements in our daily life. Vou are reading this sitting on a wooden chair, perhaps, before a fire that coulun't no made except for trees. You can't lift your eyes without seeing evidence of trees, furniture trees, picture trees, house trees, newspaper trees. You go out and smite a tree to death, and itt may or may not be necessary. You poke ;i hole in nature's distillery. You parch r little more of tho earth, rob it of a libtle nutriment. No man is moderately clear country should even kill a tree, unless he pdants another. Somo of these uays tree culture in Taranaki and other farms will be just as important an clement as cowculture. May-be you laugh, out Taihoa! We have not truly grasped the fact in Kew Zealand tliat the growing tree is nature's great fertiliser, or we would not clean up bushland "in a face" and have to fall Imck on artificial manures when the dead tree fertiliser is exhausted in a few years. Arbor Day in many parts of New Zealand is a farce. The Government isn't serious about it; nobody cares. Let the future generations take carc of themselves. The man who out of sheer love, or mere commercial gam, is propagating our magnificent native trees is much more worthy of a monument than the average person who obtains one. American botanists come to New Zealand and are so astonished and delighted with our troes that tliey gather every seed they can get to take to America. Mr. Wilford, Mayor of Wellington, when ho vi9ited England, was taken to see the great gardens and greenhouses of a noble earl. The head gardener, witli an air of mystery, took him to a special greenhouse to show him the earl's valued prize, it was a very small specimen of the New Zealand nikau palm. Any New Zealand boy would kill a dozen nikau palms to get the sweet pith. But it isn't the sentimental side of the question that matters. It is the practical, commercial side that we desire to stress. Trees are the lifeblooos of the soil, and that's all there is about it. No tree, no crops, 110 trees no grass. Most people believe the reverse is true. But—taihoa! Every tree you plant to-day is going to be a boon to the coming generation. So plant!