TOPICAL READING.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXVIII, Issue 8101, 22 March 1906, Page 4

TOPICAL READING.

Writing on life in South Afrioa, "Colonist," in the "Field" says:— To those who are content to lead the "simple life," to spend their leisure beautifying their homes and improving their land, to growing frait and vegetables, f r daily consumption, and harvesting garden produce for winter use, to observing rigid domestic economy for a few years, it is possible, to save even on an income of £2OO a year. And the uaoonventionality and freedom of a life in this exhilarating climate is compensation for any self-denial in the luxuries of life. Few newcomers, however, are oontent to remain long at the coast. The Kand attracts each and all with a strangely magnetio influence, and sooner or later they yield. Durban has become more expensive of recent years. Mr Harris, the American Consul at Chemnitz, who has written extensively on the housing of the working classes in England and Germany, has published another paper on the same subjeot through the Washington Department of Labour, in which he aays:—"The experience in Austria, where manufacturers generally furnish dwellings and fuel to their workmen free of charge, has been that in minimises the number of strikes. 1 am satisfled that this has also been the experience at Port Sunlight and Bournville village, in England, where the rents are practically fixed at rates whioh pay for maintenance, taxes and repairs, as well as at Essen, where the Krupp enterprises yield about 2 per cent on the investment. Experience has shown, in Germany and elsewhere, that the more a manufacturer learns to differentiate between a man and a maohine the more he is likely to reduoe the danger of strikes." The New South Wales Minister of Mines and Agriculture has received a report from Mr J. B. Suttor, commercial agent for New South Wales in the East, dealing with Shanghai and Central China, in the course of which he says:—"The principal troubles are doubtless caused by the Chinese students, wba practically raise the cry of 'China for the Ohnese.' The recent Shanghai riot is strong evidence of this feeling. At a moment when all appeared quiet the foreign settlement of Shanghai was invaded, but the sudden check received at the hands of the foreign residents, aided by the bluejackets from the local men-of-war, has had a very sobering influence. The aotive boycotting of all American goods appears to be as lively as ever. 1 have discussed the whole Chinese question with leading people, and there is evidence than China is moving gradually to a more settled polioy with marked and decided ohanges during the next few years." Fanning Island, in the Paoific, is for sale outright to any private person who can And the funds to purchase it. The island, a coral one, situated in the Panlflo, has a

large lagoon* rich with motber-o'-pearl. It is 'also famous for deposits off guano. It waa annexed by Britain: in 1888 as a oable station, being on. the direct route from Vancouver to Australia. The station is now to be' abandoned, bence the sale. In area> the island is fifteen square miles* and it has a population of twenty-one whites, connected with the cable company,- and two hundred Gilbert Islanders engaged in the copra industry. The sale takes place on April 17fch,. by public auotion, at Suva, Fiji, Mr Henry Shaw,, the solicitor for the British Registrar for the' Western Pacific, conducting it. At the same time Washington Island,, belonging to the Marquesas group, will also be put up to auction.

The American Department of Agriculture is employing; a meohanioal smoker, with the intention of improving the quality of cigar tobacco. It hopes by means of the machine to grow in time as good a leaf in Connecticut,. Texas, and Ohio as can be found in all. Virginia. The maohine takes five cigars at a time, and smokes tflem with more regularity than a human being. It takes a ten-seoonds' even draw, gives a puff, and then waits half a minute before it draws again. Eaoh olgar is watched carefully during process of combustion,, and every detail affecting: the filler,, binder, wrapper, ash and aroma is noted down. Where the best results are obtained, the seed of the particular plants used in the manufacture of the cigars are put aside for next year's planting. In* this way the Department is convinued that it will finally produce an unrivalled tobacco.

Professor G. Scott Elliot, in leoturing before the Research Department of the Royal Geographical Society, a few weeks ago, emphasised the necessity for a thorough man ping out of the British Empire. It might be- supposed, he said, that investigation was quite unnecessary, but if there were no military maps of Natal for the Army at the beginning of the late war, could they be sure that their other possessions and dependencies possessed them. In other countries the work of scientific exploration, so far as regards their own possessions, was more thoroughly done than in Great Britain. The president of the Society, Sir G. T. Goldie, said the Army did possess very good maps of the northern part of Natal, at the beginning of the war; ban the reason why the map for the whole oolony had not been completed was that delay had arisen owing to the Natal Government not being in a position to find the necessary money at the moment. A survey of all the tonsurveyed portions of the British Empire would, it was estimated, ooat £150,000 a year for twenty years, or three million pounds in all.