A BEGINNING.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9041, 17 March 1908, Page 4

A BEGINNING.

I Amid all their perigrinationa the Ministers have not altogether overlooked .the coming session: We have been left in the dark so far as to what the programme is to be. but it is satisfactory to know that, there is at least one measure in preparation for discussion when Parliament •meets. It will be greeted, no doubt, with intense satisfaction. The bill in ovum is for the prevention of the dissemination of hydatids. This-dis-ease is a stage of a certain tapeworm, whch lives socially in the intestines of the dog, and it is; from the „dog kept too much about the house or person that the eggs which give rise to hydatids find theirway toman. It is not stated how the proposed legislation intends to prevent the disseminaton of the hydatid, but possibly the destruction of all dogs may be suggested, as the easiest method. The destruction of man would be quite as effective. There is scope in the proposed bill to furnish Parliament with three weeks' discussion after the AdSress-in-Reply is disposed of. It would be something novel to use the hydatid for the purpose of keeping the Legislature employed while the Government is fixing up its real business for the session. It would be ungrateful to destroy the embryonic i tapeworm after performing such good 1 political service, but then statesmen are conscienceless. The humanities necessitate its- death. Some people would prefer a bill to abolish the dissemination of the bluebottle, but the country is perhaps not ripe for that yet. The tapeworm is a very good beginning.

Peace must reign within the breast of the Hon. R. McNab just now. The selection of a site for the Dairy School —which to him has been as troublous a question as the choosing of a site for the capital of the Commonwealth to the Federal Parliament—has been settled. Ever since the project, of a national Dairy School was mooted, the Minister for Agriculture has been glutted with ofFers and driven half crazy by deputations anxious to provide the State with "tht most suitable site." Parochial or personal considerations have, of course, never entered into the question. Kvery suggestion has been born of pure patriotism; and that has only enhanced Mr McNab's difficulty. From Westland to the East Coast, from Invercargill almost to the North Cape, "best sites" were figuratively chucked at the Minister's head, but at last he ha« made his choice, and Palmerston North is to be the seat of the Dairy School and Experimental Station. Lucky Palmerstonians! It never rains but it pours. Only a few days ago the Governor chose that town of the plains and plainest of towns as his winter quarters, and now the much-coveted Dairy School has been captured by the Palmerston Northians. Things are looking up in that direction. j

The determination of the Government to establish a Research Scholarship will doubtless meet with general approval. It will cost little, and may do an immensity of good. The idea is to incite research respecting colonial products, and for this purpose a University scholarship to the value of £IOO is to be offered. This should be a sufficient incentive to the youth of the dominion to devote special attention to staple and other commodities of tha country. The conditions and regulations ara to be issued shortly.