THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. TUESDAY, AUGUST 14, 1906.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXIX, Issue 8210, 14 August 1906, Page 4

THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. TUESDAY, AUGUST 14, 1906.

Nearly a million people have perished of hunger in Japan daring the last year, according to the Gst-Asien, a bilingual journal of Berlin, edited by Kisak Tamai, a Japanese. The three provinces of Miyayi, shima, and Iwati have been most severely afflicted and earnest appeals are being made for help. The Emperor and Empress of Japan, as well es many of the most prominent people in social and oommeroial ciroles, are contributing, but, as The Japan Weekly Ohroniole sajs, this famino has incidentally revealed a rather sinister element in Japanese national character. There is a good deal of money in Japan at the present time, yet people are not contributing as they might be expected to do to the needs of the three northern prefectures of the Japanese Empire. Even the Uuvernment, no longer paternal, is aooused of negleoting the people. To quote further: "Though the suffering of the peasantry of the three prefectures is terribly real, the subscriptions of the public in uther parts of Japan have in many oases not been eo large

or so readily given as when they were oalled upon to contribute to the cost of receiving and feasting the returning generals. Can it he that in the one case the people recognise that it is they who are receiving the generals and not the Government, and in the other that it is the Government's duty tn care [for the people? In the days when Japan was under an older form of rale, such distress as is now being witnessed would have been immediately relieved by shiploads of rioe aud remission of taxes. The Emperor, Shogun, or feudal lord took a pergonal interest in his people, and although in many respects they wer<» primitive and without the doubtful advantages of civilisation, they would not have been allowed to linger and die in actual want." The Japanese people are btill elated with their victory over the Russians, and are ready enough to Bpend money m celebrating their victory. They are, however, according to The Celestial Empire (Shanghai) too insensible to the miserable plight in which the northern provinces are lying.

The wildest anticipations of the British socialists, says Edward R. Pease, in the socialist weekly Die Neue Gesellschaft (Berlin), have been surpassed by the actual growth of the movement in Great Britain. While the preceding Parliament had but two Social Democrats among its members—Keir Haidie and Will Crooks, both working men—the case ia very different irith the present Lower House, whioh, we are told, counts 25 socialists on its roll. Seventeen of these belong to the Independent Labour Party. Several of them are enrolled with the Liberals, or are acting independently of any party. These independents socialists. He sums up the election triumph of the party in the following words: "While the socialists have made so great advances from a numerical point of view, this js by no means all. Out of the 50 candidates of the new Labour party, 29 were elected. In oases where Liberals and the Labour party were leagued together against the Conservatives, the Labour candidate was elected by Liberal votes. Thus it happened that Walter Hudson, a railway hand, was elected by a vote of 18,869, the second greatest majority i n the whole kingdom, and Ramsay Mac Donald, the secre tary of the Labour party, carried Leicester. In 15 cases the Labour 1 party bad to carry on a contest against both a Conservative and a Liberal opponent, and in four districts defeated both of them." He enlarges on the fact that the Labour party is by no means identi fied with the Liberals, and that Keir Bardie, an avowed socialist, has been eleoted to its leadership. Besides suoh avowed socialists as JHardie, Steadman, Shackleton, Crooks, Hudson and [MaoDonald, we are told by Mt Pease that a large cumber of extreme Radicals are working under the leadership of Sir Chflrlos Dilko, whose tendency is towards socialism, end on a division these would be likely to vote with 'tbe Labour party. The question of labour, he conoludes by saying, is at present of the most remarkable sigaifica»ce in England, and is very closely connected with the prominence in Europe of a socialistic tendency, whioh is one of the most conspicuous political | phenomena of our day. In France, as well a* ia Germany and England, this tendency is a oloud on the horizon much bigger than a man's hand.