Editorial Comment

Progress, Volume XII, Issue 3, 1 November 1916, Page 765

Editorial Comment

. In our issue of August under the accompanying heading we discussed the question of State organisation of scientific research. Since then, the matter has been well ventilated in the daily press, the discussion in Auckland having been particularly useful and informative. Our university science professors have ably advocated lines of research, showing the direct advantage to the farming and commercial classes to be derived from well-planned work. Care has also been taken to urge the value of scientific work which, on the face of things, appears to bear only remotely on the practical things of commerce. New Zealand is full of opportunities for research. Even its geography has not been fully investigated. Few countries are so marvellously endowed by nature. The Dominion has been called "a pocket edition of the world's geology," and there are things geological yet to be discovered. A good start was made in this work, but the clamant demand for roads, railways, and more settlement has kept the purse-strings tight where geological surveys are concerned; in fact the work would have been still more curtailed but for the anxiety of New Zealanders to learn the possibilities of various oil indications in the North Island. The Hon. G. W. Russell, Minister of Internal Affairs, is evidently watching the discussion with sympathetic and enlightened interest, but it is significant of his poor estimate of legislator's concern for scientific research, that he only ventured to ask Parliament for a grant of £250 for the purpose. He shrewdly takes notice of Mr. A. D. Bell's suggestion that the mica-schist deposits of Otago should be turned to account in the production of phosphates, which are used in large quantities in New Zealand's primary industry, because this proposal will win much parliamentary support from the farming community, which really dominates Parliament. A lengthy report was submitted to the Minister by Dr. Allan Thomson, director of the

The Coming Age of Research

Dominion Museum, outlining what the Hon. G. W. Russell describes as an ambitious scheme of scientific research. It was referred back for modification. The Government wishes to be extremely modest in its early steps, as the microscopic nature of the first grant shows. Courage and imagination are required, and these qualities are possessed by New Zealanders, though possibly not by the National Government in its relation to the unexplored paths of science.

A dreadful thing has been happening at Potsdam! Simutaneously with the v "strafings" of the English, and the callous blood sacrifices of Verdun, the building of a villa for the Crown Prince of Germany has been quietly going on at Potsdam, and the worst of it is, according to a Hun who writes with much emotion in the "Vossische Zeitung," that the style is English! With better taste than he could be credited with, the Crown Prince, in building a home, departed from the heavy effects of German domestic architecture, and selected a design based en the Elizabethan. He should, if he persists have a pretty home, but his choice is declared to be "a misfortune for Potsdam and for the credit of German architecture at home and abroad." It is true, says the critic, that since the war began attempts have been made in certain circles to speak of this house as belonging to "a Low German style" of architecture, "but that is mere embarrassment." The characteristics of "modern English domestic architecture" are familiar, and there is no mistaking this erection. "The Romantic chimneys, the false appearance of antiquity of the walls, the application to them of timber framing, the emphasizing of the hall by a big window, the projections which, in this instance, are devoid of the smallest practical meaning, the impression of low rooms created by low, broad windows — short, the Elizabethan character of the whole design makes the house, as it were, a foreign body in the scenery of Potsdam."

A "Blot" on Potsdan

Auckland motorists are moving in the formation of a Good Roads Association, and they deserve the heartiest support from motorists throughout the country. Local bodies should also help, for an enormous amount of ratepayers' money is wasted to-day on inadequate road work which will not stand up to the traffic. There is no governmental guidance to be obtained in regard to the relative advantages of different kinds of road surface material, though Government grants by the hundred thousand are spent- annually by local bodies in the way that suits them best, within the limitation of their local knowledge. This question of good roads is as much a national one as education, and there is more waste of public money in this direction that upon education, which is well piloted from the centre by alive, thoroughly trained administrators. "We hope to see some parallel system evolved for the making and maintenance of the country's greatest practical need, good roads.

Good Roads

The two leaders of the National

Imperial Cabinet, now in London, have venOrganisation tured further upon expressions of opinions on the imperial problem than we would have expected after their shy reticence when a few legislators, on the last day of the session, endeavoured to “draw them out.” Sir Joseph Ward’s imperialism has always been live and practical, and he may yet see his scheme of federation, coldly received at the last conference of premiers, brought into shape. His colleague, who in New Zealand talked less of the machinery of federation, and more of “the silken ties of blood and kinship,” now goes the length of suggesting an imperial convention to consider the ties of Empire. His mind is evidently running in the direction of realising that some actual framework is required. The “Round Table” school of thinkers advocate an Imperial parliament, but politicians, being prone to compromise, may first approve some enlargement of the customary imperial conferences, and the establishment of a secretariat. The activity of thinkers outside the regular ranks of the politicians serves admirably to sustain thorough-going ideals on the great subject, and to bring into the discussion a wealth of carefully gathered information which no busy statesman has the opportunity of compiling. New Zealanders, who are now taking keen interest

in the question, should be careful to avoid a bargaining attitude. The whole balance of international affairs having been rudely disturbed, enormous patience will be required to settle the many after-the-war problems. Any talk of federation being the only chance of preventing disruption should be discountenanced. If the settlement of our fighting men after the war cannot be provided for before the peace, we must give first consideration to those who have the greatest claim upon our gratitude.

The Competition for. the Art Gallery at Wanganui together with ArtGalleries in other parts of world was the subject of a lecture given by Mr. Hurst Seager, F.R.1.8.A., in Wanganui on October 10th, just after the winner of the competition had been announced by him, as Assessor for the Competition. We publish in another column the report of the lecture as given by a local paper owing to the remarkably eulogistic remarks made by the Assessor on the designs sent in. He states frankly with reference to the first design "that we are to have not merely a building that will be "good enough,'" but which will be the "best possible," and better than the world's best (the italics are —Ed.) in all its essential features— gallery which will be scientifically correct, structurally perfect, and architecturally beautiful." Referring to the four designs sent in for the final competition, Mr. Seager is reported to have said that "all of themand especially the design placed secondwould have ensured a more perfectly appointed art gallery than he had seen in any part of the world." We wonder whether any Assessor could have gone further! The winner has our heartiest congratulations.

Art Galleries of Europe and the Wanganui Gallery