CURRENT TOPICS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVI, Issue 293, 14 May 1914, Page 4

CURRENT TOPICS.

ULSTER CALM. The telegrams sent froin • Belfast to London by the ''special correspondents" of the Conservative newspapers have been really funny. ''The culm of Ulster has not been shaken by intimidation," writes a representative of the Daily Express. "I saw more signs of.emotion ill the streets of Tokio the day Japan began her war with Russia, and again at Sofia on the eve of Bulgaria's first struggle against her traditional enemy a yean and a half ago, than.you could iuive found here yesterday at the height of a crisis that is every whit as momentous for a loyal people." The correspondent goes on to describe a visit he paid to Sir Edward Orson. ITe had to show his pass to a- "sergeant's patrol in military grey coats" before he was admitted to the presence of the head of the "provisional Government.'' "The men I had come to see were strolling about among the trees," he says. "They came leisurely up tlie drive, the tall form of Sir Edward Carson pacing beside that of Lord .Londonderry, and the shorter, soldierly figure of Lieutcnant-General Sir George Richardson, Ulster com-mander-in-chief, on the other side. We met at the crest of the sloping lawn, in the shadow of the lofty stall' which flies the British flag from sunrise until sunset. Immi'diatMv belotv us a sijuad of special service men oil' duly were kicking a ball over the grass beside the mess tent of their corps , We

talked together as a motor-cyclist *liol up the drive with despatch es. The envelope he handed over was sealed with black wax, and it contained messages for the commander-in-chief." Then the correspondent tells how Sir ICihvard ! arson, safe behind the military patrol in great-coats, hurled verbal defiaiue at Mr. A?i|iiith.

TIIIC I'AKTY .STI! 1 !•]•:. We iiiainlain with the iitn:"-t confidi'iiee that an elective Upper Ii 01: would mean a J'nrUier emitribution :n the party strife o." the l)wntini">n, a state of all'airs thai the majority of the jU'Oplr do not to ;-eu. Lri us consid -\- for a innmrnl what would ha ve liei'i] tile slate of afl'airs if Air. Massev hid had an elective Legislative Council I deal with when lie gained of lice. II is only reasonable to assume that the

Council would have been eumpesed prie cipally of men of the same puliti.-al colour as the partv thai has i'ovcru. d New Zealand for .so many years. It would have b<vn a Cimneil <if liien elected under strong pirlv pledges. Tie ve would have at once been war between the two Houses, possibly u double dissolution, and the Dominion would been plunged into I lie throes of a leii'T party fight fr"in one end of the |:uminion to the other. lint Mr. Mass y had the good fortune to liml a Coun.il that, although it, was largely comp set! 1/ men of a politiral party opposite to that of his owti, it was willing to give him the "square ileal" which he is reputed to prize so highly.—Eltliam Argus.