CURRENT TOPICS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 5, 30 June 1911, Page 3

CURRENT TOPICS.

HEALTH OF THE MAORIS. In ancient days the Maori was a lusty person, who rarely died of disease. He either perished of senile decay or per tomahawk. He had many activities and interests. Je worked hard. There was po bother about the birth-rate or intantile mortality, and Nature went on ner way without interference by science or theory. To-day we are anxious about the Maori and his (or her) health. We find it necessary to bring artificiality to the aid of a people who trusted to Nature before we cnnie. Under newconditions the Maori is still very much as he used to be as far as his domestic life i.s concerned, with the exception that his activities and interests arc gone, the customs.that made him physically great gone, and his ancient methods distorted by the introduction of hybrid pakeha customs. As usual with native races in contact with the white man, the Maori lws lost his vitality, because he has been forced to abandon the usages that kept him fit and strong.; As it is quite impossible to reproduce the conditions under which the Maori throve physically, we must, with more or less success, preserve the same cures that we use ourselves. That is to say, wc must force the Maori to live as the pakeha lives, seeing that be is not permitted to live jn Maori (fashion. The matter of the health of the race has been discussed at the Hospital Conference. The pakeha knew' thirty years ago that the Maori was doomed to disease and death in being forced to conform to some pakeha customs and to give up his activities. It is only of late years, however, that the gravity of the position has been acknowledged, and the authorities see the urgent need of drastic remedy if the remnant of the race is to exist. Laziness, "half-and-half" habits—half pakeha, half Maori—waipiro and new "pleasures" have got to be fought. It is useless using reams of scientific talk or indulging in learned disquisition* on the subject. We have always held that the Maori cannot survive if he does not work. To make it an offence for any Maori (whether he is landed or landless) to be idle is his only salvation. No system of sending nurses to villages can be of lasting benefit if laziness is not abolished, and any system that merely instructs and docs not insist is worse than useless. The majority of the Maori people cannot he permanently influenced into a certain line of action. They must be forced.

A FEARFUL DISCLOSURE. New Zealanders who read the papers have probably soaked in every word dealing with the doings in London during the Coronation festivities, and it must have occurred to them that his overworked Majesty King George and that sensible woman. Queen Mary, have devoted the whole'of their precious time to S'ir Joseph Ward, Bart., and Sir John G. Findlay, KjC.. L.L.D., K.C.M.G., and A.G.N.Z., and Mister Andrew Fisher, P.O. The glittering, array of functions arranged for | the occasion appear to have been! attended mainly by these personages, and ] the glad thought comes into the minds | of New Zealanders that of the twelve, million people who were gathered in Lon- j don, the pedestalled ones were the poli-1 tical representatives from Australia and ■ New Zealand. The exigencies of public prints, however, make it necessary (in the hands of the London cable'men) that j no cheers but those given for our repre-1 sontatives shall reach this far. In fact, | the British cable man believes that Aus- i traliana and New Zealanders must be gently patted on the brain, so to speak, and must believe that on the great. Imperial beach there is only one pebble, or at most two. We know that dignified dukes and beautiful duchesses, eminent earls and lovely ladies do, as a matter j of fart, make the finest possible hosts and hostesses, mainly because they possess every facility for being hospitable, but it is almost sadly remembered that these people of cerulean blood - lavishly entertained our more or less humble soldiers and our not highly elevated footballers in just as charming a way as they have entertained our more illustrious representatives. South Africa at the present moment is being per- ' suaded that the' Imperial foreshore is! decorated solely by its particular pebble; I Canada, too, knows thlt Sir Wilfrid is; the only person, who takes tea with 1 marquises; and' Newfoundland that its I eminent representative is the only man ! whose remarks at the Imperial Conference were worth reporting. If a .series of great functions have any utilities—and, of course, they have—one is that they may leave in the minds of some people ] a thought that "tncre are others-." The paper that mentions that the millions of London cheered Mr. Smith, Premier of the Kookaburra Islands, is merely talking to the Kookaburra!tes. To attract the particular attention of a London crowd a stranger should be properly labelled. To emphasise his greatness, the overseas celebrity should tell Fleetstreet all about it. Tf an overseas celebrity isn't very careful, he may-be mistaken among twelve million people for a mere "mister."

PHYSICAL EFFICIENCY. "A scheme that must make for a physically efficient community must sooner or later be taken in hand." That is Mr. Fowlds' opinion, and not his only one by any means; yet how slow our people are to rise to it. If we were wise we should insist in the "sooner'and not the "later" inauguration of such a scheme as the Minister indicated. Why .should £ 13,000 a year stand .in the way of 30 per cent, of the children attending-State schools'; We do not know how many thousands are spent annually in. preparing to resist future enemies. In the, case of the children the enemies ai;e always lurking around in the form of tuberculosis, adenoids, and other ailments with longsounding names; -and to these enemies nearly a third of our scholars are in danger of succumbing, or at least .suffering from their inroads, if the doctors visited our schools one of the first things they would probably do would lie to declare a very long holiday to a number of the scholars, and to nearly all the little mites who crowd the infant classes. Witnout casting any doubt on the usual modern practice of medicine, there are doctors that children need, especially precocious infants, and that is the attention of Drs. Play, Fresh Air, Shouting and laughter. It is, of course, desirable to have our school rolls showing increases, but it should be at the top end and not at the bottom. Except where there are kindergarten rooms and teacliers. no children should be admitted to our schools under six or seven years of age, and not evim then in the case of nervous, delicate children. Medical ' inspection would soon show that we are paying too dearly, in the health of our i children, for our compulsory attendance and encouragement of an early school age and juvenile book knowledge. The prophet of old pictures the citv with its old men in the citv of holiness, and has the children p!avi'ii<r in. the streets, not.in the infant .schools. We say. set up the medical inspection and iive the doctors a, free hand without fear as to the average attendance declining. Rude health is much more desirable than more early passing of standards of examination. '