GENERAL NEWS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVI, Issue 4, 5 June 1913, Page 7

GENERAL NEWS.

THE .HARVEST OF THE FUTURE. The' cult of the cornfield lifts been the great agrarian incubus of the ages, while, the magnificent potentialities 01 the tree-, harvest have never been realised in the j temperate zones and liave been taken as 1 i a matter of course by the indolent folk I of the tropics (remarks the Lyttelton. Times). Now Professor Smith, speak-1 , ing as the herald of awakening science,' | declares that "the agriculture of tree-! j crops is the agriculture of great yields."! Man has worn himself 1 out with cereal culture in liis nervous haste to be fed, while fruit culture is only being under-j I stood, even at this late hour, by a few; far-sighted investigators like Luther Bur-! bank. Yet the rocky, unploughed chest-! nut groves of Italy yield the same .re-| turn as the rich wheat .fields of .the' United States. Professor Smith shrewd-j ly .argues that the fruit .harvest will bulk I larger as Bcience and intelligence gradu- J ally supplant the "rule .of .thumb" ods of diet and industry .which ,have I ma.de us slaves of the plough, fie assarts, moreover, that scientific ,plaattaeodjng "will transform (agriculture .06! the steam-engine has transformed trans- i portation." Instead of cutting down' trees for cornfields, he would turn half tlie American farms into fruit graves, .and 1 thus double the food production of the l United States, while hugely reducing the i tabor necessary for an adequate supply; of food. The professor has mo ulterior; design on the matutinal pot of "mush"; on (wTiach America's gfeatness is founded, as surely as .that of. Caledonia .on "pamtch," nor is he thinking of scrap- ■ ping the plough altogether as a relic of j I barbarism. But the dietician and the agriculturalist will depend upon it less and less as the knowledge.of the scientist! expands. There is much to be said, inj all seriousness, on the side of fruit-farm-, ing as the prime food industry of the fu- 1 tee. The doctor backs up the biologist, in pointing man back to the frugivorous* diet to which his structure is adapted. \ It is significant in this connection that! food reform—that is, the abolition of flesh-eating—is making slow but steady! progress. , Vegetarians to-day are fa<r| more numerous than total abstainers were fifty years ago, and it would be 1 fatuous to suppose that, at the same 1 rate of progress, abattoirs will be much safer for investment fifty years hence than breweries are to-day in the rapidly "drying" States of America. The frugivorous element in the menu of modern man has made enormous strides since that professional innovation, the dietician, became the mentor of the table. The date harvest of the Arab seems responsible for a measure of vitality and endurance which the chop-fed Occidental cannot emulate. It may be that frozen mutton will not bulk so largely in the markets of A.D. 2000 as the walnut crop or the tomato harvest, and perhaps humanity. will be none the worse for the change in its choice of food. •>

THE NEW SCHOOL IN ENGLAND, j Mr. Joseph McCabe, whose prolific in-1 tellectual. output iii science, ethics, Ger- J man translations, and modern biological 1 research 011 its more popular side, has J won him a reputation co-extensive with 1 the English language, is at present in Wellington. "Radicalism to-day," he observed to a Pressman, "is a stage between Liberalism and Socialism. The old school of philosophical Radicals has disappeared. The intense individualism to-day is represented by men like W. H. Mallock, a Conservative. The new school, formed by Mr. G. Bernard Shaw, Mr. G. Wells, to some extent, Mr. Chesterton and others, is more inclined to Socialism. They take but little interest in party politics, but more in social and industrial matters. By the novel and the drama, they have won an astounding influence in England. Mr. Shaw's influence, however, is greater in America than in England. This school is modify'"" the old individualism, and causing people to turn more to social reorganisation. England is full of social idealism, and never was she more prosperous. Her vital and crime statistics are among the healthiest in the world, and despite the utterance of some, pessimists, wherever you can test statistically, England is in the front rank of civilisation. And it is a good thing to say that wiis prosperity does not restrain social enthusiasm. Within fifty years, the mass of the people have had their conditions of life completely transformed. Still, they need to go a long way to reach the level j of New Zealaud and Australia."

THE VALUE OF ADVERTISING.

The report of the Rhyl Advertising Association for 1912, which was presented at the annual meeting in London last month, contained a striking tribute t? tlie value of newspaper .ortising. "There is no' doubt," it was stated, "that the newspaper advertisements have paid us handsomely, and we have again proved the wisdom of continuous advertising, as there has not been a single day in the whole year but we have had applications for our guides. During the winter months there lias been no falling off, and we are pleased to say that we are continually receiving requests for information as to Rhyl. Nearly 7000 guides were sent by post. These applications came from all parts of the world, and we are pleased to say that we have answered enquiries respecting Rhyl from the most unlooked-for quarters." The association, which spent considerably more on newspaper advertising than on any other form of publicity, intends to extend its campaign this year.

MILLIONAIRES WARNED. ■Mr. Marshal], Vice-President of the United States, lias received hundreds of letters denouncing liiin as a Socialist for his speech in New York recently, when lie warned millionaires that if they were not careful they wonld find the proposal raised and carried that the State should dispose of great fortunes. Mr. Marshall stuck to his guns, and declared that the idea was not original with him, and that some such plan would eventually be adopted in the United States. "From men of all classes," Mr. Marshall continued, "I have heard expressions of disgust with the present ccrmoniic policies. Men are asking that opportunities that once existed and are now monopolised shall be restored to tlieni. In my speech at New York T said: 'The right to inherit and the right to devise are neither inherent nor constitutional, but, on the contrary, they are sirnplv privileges given bv the State to its citizens.' Men of judgment have expressed to me the opinion that were a vot" lo lie taken on the proposition that all estates over £'2(l.(]oo should revert lo I lie Slate upon the dealh of the owner, I lie i:2(l,()(HI beimr exempt, it would be carried by two to one."