SNIPPETS FROM TALKS

Radio Record, Volume VIII, Issue 38, 29 March 1935, Page 22

SNIPPETS FROM TALKS

GR. MORRIS N. WATT (4YA) lt is a common conception that the amount of magnification a microscope is capable of is an index of its usefulness. Now this not correct. Resolution is what counts-not magnification. Any object is capable of being magnifiel enormously, but without the very best corrected lenses and considerable understanding and skill in manipulating these lenses and the source of. light it does not follow that the finer structure and detail of the object will be any better seen. The power of resolving fine detail is the -crucial. test in microscopy. For the ordinary amateur a low power microscope magnifying from ten to 100 diameters, and prefer-. ably a binocular, in which one obtains perfect sterioscopic vision, will’ provide him with immeasureably more enjoyment than the best high-powered instrument capable of resolving 100,000 lines to the inch, and for the manipulation of which considerable training and experience are required. MR, LEICESTER WEBB (SYA) It is a matter for regret that so few of the hundreds of journalists, publicists and students who have investigated post-revolutionary Russia’ have ‘paid any attention to the political aspects

of Communism. There are enough books about the Five-Year Plan alone to fiill a public library. The number of works dealing with the constitution of the U.S.S.R. can be numbered on the fingers of one hand, and not one of them has been translated into English. There are several reasons for this neglect. One is that the Communists themselves do not attach any importance to political forms. The. present system of government in Russia is, in their eyes, merely the scaffolding which makes possible the erection of the Communist society. And when true Communism is achieved-the present phase is merely State Socialism-there will be neither States nor governments. So it is said in the books of the prophet Marx. Another reason is that in the Soviet State there is no clear line of demarcation between politics and economics. Many of the political institutions of the Soviet system cannot pro- , perly be understood except in relation to the economic objectives of Communism. But perhaps the strongest reason is the difficulty of unearthing facts. Methods of government very greatly in the constituent republics of the union. Moreover, the written constitution and the various codes of law cannot be taken at their face value, ‘since their practical effect is constantly being modified by executive action. The Soviet political system is a heirarchy erected on the basis of the workers’ and soldiers’ councils which spontaneously came into existance after the colapse of the. Tsarist ‘administrative system in 1917. In the country districts the basis of the soviet is regional;.in the towns it is functional, that is, each group of factory workers has its own soviet. The work of the town soviet is both political and economic. On the one hand it elects delegates to the district and provincial soviets and exercises certain local government: functions; on the other hand it discusses and criticises the organisation and working conditions of its factory. Although in its political work the Soviet is closely guided and ‘controlled by the local agents of the Communist party, it discusses industrial questions with the utmost freedom and frequency. After watching some of the factory soviets.and work Lord Passfield made the following generalisation: "The English working man is free to criticise his government, but is not free to criticise his boss. With the Russian working man it is the other way round."? MISS MONA TRACY (8YA) That convicts escaped from the New South Wales penal settlement, and runaway sailors, provided the greater number of white men found living on Pacific islands during the early part ot the 19th century there is little doubt. One such who lived at. the Bay of Islands in 1805 was mentioned by John Savage, a surgeon who. visited New Zealand in that year. This mysterious white man shunned all intercourse with Europeans, and on the approach of a ship he would retire to the interior. His country, or the motives which in- _ duced him to remain in New Zealand were unknown, and Savage assumed that he had been put ashore from some ship for mutinous conduct. He had a native wife, and his half-caste child was ‘the first instance of such actually seen in New Zealand, though Captain Cook was told of one when he visited Queen Charlotte Sound in 1777. Again, when

Lieutenant Charles Wilkes, of the United States Navy, was on his scientific exploring expedition to the Pacific in 1840 he came across several white men who had lived for many years among the natives of the South Sea Islands. In Fiji he met an old man whose story he obtained. As a record of adventure it would be hard to equal. The man, ‘one Paddy Connel, had been pressed into the army during the Irish rebellion of 1795. After many amazing experiences, including that of being put -on trial for his life, he had been sent aboard a ship bound for New South Wales. .When he arrived at Sydney his name.was found not to be’on the register of prisoners, so he was set at liberty. Eventually he drifted on board" a ship, and after visiting New Zealand and Norfolk Island he landed at Fiji) where he decided to gesert. At the time Wilkes saw him, Paddy Connel had been for more than forty years in Fiji. He had one hundred wives and 48 living children. ~ In 1804 six convicts working on a road gang at Norfolk Island killed their guard and made their escape in a small boat. They set out for a little island distant about two days’ sail from their prison. Rough weather prevented their reaching the island until 14 days had passed, and when the boat ~ot there the six men were only four. Fortunately the survivors found an abundance of food, and for five months they lived a Robinson Crusoe existance. Then a whaling ship turned up. She had lost some of her crew by desertions on the New Zealand coast, and was vlad to take the four convicts aboard. They remained with her for three years. Then when the whaler filled up with oil and was ready for her passage to England they were, at their own request, left with a seal party at the south point of Stewart Island. And now there appeared another ship, the schooner ‘‘Adventure,’? which was engaged in sealing. The men were persuaded to join her, and for a time all went well. Their agreement with the captain was that when he sailed for England jhe was to take them along with him. Instead of that he marooned them on the desolate Snares Group, giving them afew potatoes, but nothing else; and there for several weary years they dragged out a miserable existance, living on sea-birds, seals and fernroot. One of them went mad, whereupon his companions pushed him over a precipice. When at last the castaways were rescued, they were reduced to skeletons. and were willing to face the -vengeance of the convict authorities at Hobart town, whither they wére taken, just in order to escape from the dreadful island on which they had so heartlessly been marooned. MR. B. A. BARRER (8YA) Comparing the tennis courts of Sydney and Melbourne with our own Wilding Park, it is all in our favour. The White City courts at Rushcutters’ Bay are the meeting ground of the N.S.W. champions. Here the pavilion is set on a hill overlooking the arena, which is five minutes’ walk away. The pavilion is.a particularly good one-hot and ' cold showers, attendants, tearooms and a bar ‘at which they sell fizzy drinks only ; you can get blown up with lemonade squash for sixpence. The courts are used all the year round, so that all the playing area of about 40 grass courts is never being used at once, and about ten courts are rested in rotation.

Nevertheless jt tends to crumble, and bad bounces are fairly common. The essential difference between the Australian and the New Zealand game is their skill at doubles. The whole game is played at a greater speed. Even comparatively mediocre players cultivate fast services and smashes and storm the net at every opportunity. They miss some shots both hard and easy, but never an easy smash, and by the sheer persistence and speed of their boring in they win many points, This wag very evident. in the International Doubles Match, in which Crawford and McGrath beat Perry and Hughes 6-1, 6-2, 7-5. With beautifully placed and fiercely offensive services the Australians stormed the net. Crawford was magnificent in this match. Overhead ‘he missed nothing, and in manner re_miniscent of Geoff Ollivier at his best; ‘finished rally after. rally with all four players at the net by acutely-angled volleys or smashes straight down the centre of the court. His stroking in the singles in which he beat Perry 6-0, 6-4, was perfection itself, ~ MR. W. H. CARSON (4YA)_ The name of Oscar Slater has been prominently before the public for more than 25 years. It will be remembered that as long ago ‘as 1909 he was tried for the murder of Marion Gilchrist, an elderly lady who resided in West Prin- , cess Street, Glasgow: The. Crown’s case against Slater was based almost entirely upon evidence of identity, 1 have previously mentioned that such evidence is not to be relied upon, except when supported by other facts. A consideration of Slater’s case. amply supports this statement, This case is noteworthy also for the fact that the accused man was arrested on what was subsequently admitted to be an entirely wrong clue. In spite of this circumstance and many other: weak links in thé chain of evidence, Slater was convicted upon a majority verdict. Five jurors were in favour of a verdict of ‘‘Not Proven," nine declared the prisoner to be guilty, and one solitary juryman was of the opinion that the verdict should be one of‘Not Guilty." " Slater was sentenced to-déath, but afterwards reprieved andsent to Peterhead Goal. Practically from the time of his conviction there were agitations against what was openly stated to be a miscarriage of justice. An official inquiry held im 1914, five years after the trial ,served only to deepen the mystery. In 1927, after serving 19 years in Peterhead, Slater was released. He immediatel appealed against the sentence and his conviction was quashed. Strangely enough, however, his appeal was upheld upon the ground that the judge at che original tria] had misdirected the jury, and not because the Appeal Court considered that the evidence upon Slater was convicted failed to establish that he had committed the murder. Finally, Slater received a pardon and a Government grant of £6,000. These are the brief facts of the famous Slater case ‘The case for the prosecution depended almost entirely upon the evidence of witnesses who swore as to the identity of the | accused man This evidence referred to two separate sets of circumstances: Firstly, occasions upun which a man, supposed to be Slater, was observed watching the house in which Miss Gilchrist lived and wherein she was murdered, and, secondly, evidence concerning the man, identified as Slater, who was seen running from the direction of Miss Gilchrist’s house upon the evening when she met her death.