Normally, when the topic of road competition comes to the fore, thoughts are mainly directed to the passenger-carrying motor bus and its effects upon railway passenger business. It is, however, not only on the passenger-side that the problem of road competition has to be faced. In the movement of freight traffic the road carrier has made big progress at Home and throughout Europe generally, and the closest attention is being paid to methods calculated to meet the new situation. Unlike railways, the road carriers are able to pick and choose their loads as they wish. Also, a problem is presented by the difference between the two systems of charging. Home railway charges are based on the value of the load, whereas the road carrier bases his charges on the truck-mile cost. It is estimated that competing road transport in the area served by one of the principal Home railways carries 58 per cent. of the goods traffic between points up to forty miles apart; 19 per cent. of the goods traffic between points over forty miles apart; and 24 per cent. of the goods traffic over wide areas under a comprehensive system of radial distribution by the traders’ own fleets.
To meet road competition, the Home railways have in many cases reduced their conveyance rates, but this is, of course, a movement that cannot go on for ever. More encouraging measures, which have had good results, have been the running of more fast goods trains, the improvement of goods train punctuality, the betterment of terminal facilities, and the extension of railway-operated road motors giving a combined rail-road door-to-door service. One Home railway has introduced a system of registered transits at a registration fee of half-a-crown per consignment. Under this scheme, traders are informed beforehand of the time at which a registered consignment will be delivered at destination, and the transit of such consignments is specially expedited and controlled from point to point.
High Praise from Distinguished Pianist.
On his present tour of the Dominion with the equally famous singer, Peter Dawson, the world famous pianist, Mark Hambourg, when interviewed by a representative of the Evening Post, Wellington, was full of praise for New Zealand's Auckland-Wellington Main Trunk Express. “That railway journey was one of the most comfortable I have ever experienced,” he said.
The New Zealand
Railways
Magazine
Railways
Magazine
Registered for transmission by Post as a Newspaper.
Published by the
New Zealand Government Railways Department
“”
For Better Service.
Service CopyVol. 6. No. 2.
Wellington, New Zealand
As the melting pot changes the nature of metals, causing rearrangement of molecules, the production of new combinations, and the precipitation of dross, so the depression at present in charge of the world is producing changes in political, social, and commercial life which would never have occurred without it, and which will result in the elimination of much that is useless and wasteful in all three spheres.
In the railways of this country we live in fast-moving or (as some would have it) “locomotive” times. Since the year started we have seen the withdrawal of Divisional Superintendents, reductions in services, staffs, and rates of remuneration, closer co-operation with the Tourist Department, earlier retirements, and a new system of control introduced under which the Railway Board of Directors takes over most of the functions previously performed by the Minister of Railways, and the General Manager occupies a position analogous to that of the previous Railway Board. All these changes were either produced or accelerated as a result of the depression.
Thus there are readjustments on every side, and alertness and alacrity are necessary to keep pace with them. For still the day's work must go on, and the better it is done by each individual the better will be the result for all. Meanwhile we have the assurance of all previous history that the deeper the dip of the “dep.” (as the depression is now sometimes familiarly, nay, almost affectionately called) the bigger will be the recovery when the wheel comes round full cycle.
The railways may be the victims of loaded dice on the competitive side—the general transport situation is also in the melting pot—but so far as New Zealand is concerned one million pounds was declared to be the Department's last year's contribution to the making of a national deficit. Apart from the effect of the depression, much of this was caused by the short view taken by many travellers and business people throughout the Dominion in giving their transport to other than the national system, with the cumulative effect of both adding to the depression and producing the need for increased taxation.
At this point it is worth mentioning the idea propounded in some quarters that too much is being produced. This cannot be true, in general until all wants of a desirable kind are supplied and a balance is left over, which we know to be far from what has occurred up to the present. On
One of the most pressing questions facing railway undertakings is that of meeting the respective needs of the smoker and the non-smoker in passenger travel. Normally it is the custom at Home to label certain portions of the passenger trains for the use of smokers, while in some continental lands the opposite practice prevails and smoking may be indulged in everywhere except in those portions of trains marked “non-smoking” (says our London Correspondent).
In recent years there has been a marked growth of the smoking habit, and to meet changing conditions the Great Western Railway of England has just arranged for twenty-five per cent. of its passenger accommodation in trains to be labelled “non-smoking,” leaving the remaining seventy-five per cent. available for ardent worshippers at the shrine of “My Lady Nicotine.” This arrangement will, it is thought, be appreciated by passengers generally. It is not only the male smoker who has nowadays to be considered. There is also a large proportion of smokers among the fair sex, while many women not actually indulging in the habit themselves seem to love to journey in the more or less fragrant atmosphere of a smoking compartment. It is just by adapting themselves to changing circumstances such as these that railways continue to maintain their popularity. In railway working, as in other walks of life, it is the little things that count.
The British Advertiser's Weekly tells of a new and vigorous counter-attack against the competition of the cigarette coupon gift schemes which has been launched by John Elkan Ltd., the jewellers.
This firm are now retaliating by giving away cigarettes to every purchaser of their jewellery, watches, and fancy goods, and are attracting a lot of attention by the display they are making of the scheme at one of their city branches.
The purchaser receives twenty cigarettes for every 5/- worth of goods purchased, whilst a guarantee is given that there has been no increase in prices. Moreover, the purchaser can have his own particular brand of cigarette.
An amusing instance occurred in the case of a customer who was purchasing a £100 engagement ring. When he found that he would be entitled to no fewer than 8,000 cigarettes with it, he promptly enquired whether the firm would also give him a tobacconist's license, so that, without breaking the law, he could sell the surplus cigarettes to his friends.
The point that emerges from this new angle to the coupon war is that, whoever wins, while the battle rages the ammunition, cigarettes, will be used in increasing quantities by both sides.
The publication of the March-April issue of the Magazine completed the fifth volume. Readers are again reminded that they may send forward their accumulated copies (May 1930 to March-April 1931 inclusive) for binding purposes. As hitherto, the volumes will be bound in cloth with gilt lettering, at a cost of 5/6 per volume. Those desirous of having their copies bound may hand them to the nearest stationmaster, who will transmit them free, with the sender's name endorsed on the parcel, to the Editor, New Zealand Railways Magazine, Wellington. When bound, the volumes will be returned to the forwarding stationmaster, who will collect the binding charge. In order to ensure expedition in the process of binding, copies should reach the Editor not later than 22nd July, 1931.
Stern, strong aboveRises the wall of mountain.
—Mrs. Hubert Heron.
(Govt. Publicity photo.)
“Windy Point” in the world-famed Buller Gorge, South Island, New Zealand.
The Change In Control.
As it Affects the Public.
A great adventure, with the odds on success—that is how the change in the system of administration adopted under the Railways Amendment Act of 1931 impresses me.
It represents the materialisation of an idea with possibilities for the future welfare of the railway system of the Dominion and of the Dominion itself.
The freeing of the Department from the deflecting or dispersing power of non-business influences and considerations clears the decks for the emergence of a policy which will allow the principles of modern business management to have fuller play.
The responsibilities of the Board are great and obvious. Equally great, if not greater, is the responsibility of the public to adjust its point of view and its methods of approach to the railway business to conform to the new conditions. The change connotes the abandonment of the political point of view as affecting the Department's business and of political channels of approach to the Department. The extent and effectiveness of the change in both these aspects will, in the last analysis, depend on the public itself. It is a great opportunity.
Much interest has been felt throughout the service in the probable effect of the change in control of the Railways, upon the position and prospects of members. Therefore to the members of the staff I would give this message:—
The change means the emancipation of the Department from trammelling influences. Our main consideration now is to get the business and do the job. If we don't get the business then there's no job. There can be no such things as sheltered positions in the service—everyone must be able to prove himself necessary and valuable to the Department or there is no reason for his employment.
It is my belief that the new order provides a way past many stumbling blocks which have hitherto impeded progress and made our service not understood. From now on we should find fuller opportunity for all the business capacity and enterprise within the Department in watching expenditure, inducing patronage, and producing a service dependable in every respect and worthy of a great nationallyowned public institution.
General Manager.
A Directorate of Five Members.
Mr. H. H. Sterling, present General Manager, to become Chairman of the Board.
The personnel of the Government Railways Board, appointed in accordance with legislation passed during the recent emergency session of Parliament, was announced on 9th June, by the Prime Minister, Rt. Hon. G. W. Forbes. The five members are:
Colonel James Jacob Esson, C.M.G., retired Civil Servant, Wellington, the chairman.
Sir James Henry Gunson, C.M.G., O.B.E., merchant, Auckland.
Mr. Edward Newman, C.M.G., farmer, Marton.
Mr. Daniel Reese, merchant, Christchurch.
Mr. George Walter Reid, B. Com., F.P.A. (N.Z.), Accountant, Dunedin.
The appointment of Sir James Gunson and Mr. Reese is for three years, and that of Mr. Newman and Mr. Reid for two years.
Colonel Esson's appointment is only temporary. Mr. H. H. Sterling, General Manager of Railways, retires from his present position in September next to become Chairman of the Board.
Mr. Forbes stated that the Government had endeavoured to make the board representative and to select members who would administer the railways in the spirit in which the legislation had been framed.
The Prime Minister, the Rt. Hon. G. W. Forbes, in referring to the changes in administrative control of the Railways which operate from June 1st of this year, said that so far as the chairmanship was concerned there would be an important development in due course, which would involve the retirement of Mr. H. H. Sterling from the position of General Manager of Railways, to enable him to become, ultimately, Chairman of the Board. Under the terms of the Finance Act of 1931 Mr. Sterling would not be eligible for retirement until September 4th next, therefore Colonel Esson had been appointed temporarily to the position of Chairman. In September he would be succeeded by Mr. Sterling.
“The opportunity of utilising the abilities and experience of Mr. Sterling in the wider sphere as chairman of the Railway Board presented itself to the Government,” said Mr. Forbes, “when the General Manager wrote to me in connection with the compulsory retirement of a number of his officers, expressing the desire that he should be included in the review of staff for economy purposes. Mr. Sterling has an agreement regarding his appointment as General Manager, but he placed himself at the Government's disposal, and in so doing he has made a substantial financial sacrifice. The Government recognises Mr. Sterling as an officer of the highest ability, possessing great experience of railway operation and administration, and is pleased that the full value of his judgment will be placed at the country's disposal as chairman of the Railway Board.
Members of the
Railway Board of Control
Railway Board of Control
S. P. Andrew photo. Sir James Gunson, O.B.E.
H. H. Clifford photo. Mr. D. Reese.
S. P. Andrew photo. Mr. Edward Newman, C.M.G.
Mr. G. W. Reid.
Mr. H. H. Sterling, L.L.B., M. Inst. T., General Manager of the New Zealand Railways, who becomes Chairman of the Railway Board of Control as from 4th September.
“The Government has endeavoured to make the Board representative and comprised of members who will thoroughly carry out the spirit in which the legislation has been framed. The object is to run the railways in accordance with business principles giving efficient and economical service, and if possible to lessen the deficits which constitute such a heavy burden on the taxpayer.
Biographical Notes.
Colonel J. J. Esson, C.M.G., who is to be the first chairman of the Railway Board, was born at Picton in 1869, and was educated at public schools and privately. He joined the Public Service in the Post and Telegraphic Department at Picton in 1881. From Picton he was transferred to New Plymouth, Marton and Wellington. In Wellington he was transferred to the accounts branch, where he took charge of the clearing room. After twenty - five years in the Postal Department, he was transferred to the Treasury, where he held successively the positions of clerk-in-charge of the pay and revenue branch, and Chief Clerk and Inspector. In 1916 he was appointed Accountant and Assistant-Secretary. On the retirement of Colonel Collins as Auditor
S. P. Andrew, photo.
Colonel J. J. Esson, temporary Chairman of the Railway Board.
In 1925 Colonel Esson was appointed Chairman of the Royal Commission on Rural Credits, which investigated farm finance in the various countries of the world, and furnished a valuable report to the Government as a basis for our present Rural Intermediate Credits Act. Subsequently he was appointed Chairman of the Rural Intermediate Credits Board.
Having had lengthy service in the Volunteer and Territorial Forces, he was commander of the old Wellington City Rifles, and later of the 5th Wellington Regiment. When war broke out he volunteered for active service, and was selected for duty on the headquarters staff, being appointed Assistant-Quartermaster-General to the New Zealand Expeditionary Force. He was mentioned in dispatches and awarded the C.M.G. After the evacuation of the Peninsula he was appointed Colonel Commandant of the N.Z.E.F. in Egypt.
Sir James Gunson is one of Auckland's most prominent public men. He was born in Auckland in 1877, the eldest son of the late Mr. W. Gunson, and was educated at the Auckland Public Schools and Grammar School. Leaving school in 1892, he entered the business of his father, which, after his father's death, he himself conducted for several years until it was purchased by Messrs. Wright, Stephenson and Co. Sir James first entered public life in 1908, when he was elected a member of the Council of the Auckland Chamber of Commerce, of which body he became president two years later. In 1909 Sir James was elected a member of the Auckland Harbour Board, and two years later he became chairman of the board, and held that office until 1915, when he was elected Mayor. In 1917, 1919, 1921, and 1923 Sir James was reelected to the Mayoralty without opposition. He did not contest the position in 1925. He took a leading part in war activities, having been president of the Auckland Patriotic Association since its inception, also chairman of the joint committee of the Red Cross Society and St. John Ambulance Association, and, in addition, he served on the National Efficiency Board. In 1918 he was made an Officer and later a Commander of the British Empire, and in 1922 a Companion of the Order of St. Michael and St. George. He was knighted in 1924.
Mr. Edward Newman, C.M.G., is a son of the late Edward Newman, Fleet surgeon in the Royal Navy. He arrived in New Zealand in the early 'eighties, and after a short experience on sheep stations he settled at Turakina on a bush farm, which was later subdivided for dairying. Mr. Newman sat as member of Parliament for Rangitikei from 1908 to 1922. He was called to the Legislative Council in 1923, and served there for seven years. Mr. Newman took a prominent part in the affairs of the New Zealand Farmers’ Union. For twenty years he served as a member of the Rangitikei County Council. He was the originator of the New Zealand Sheepfarmers’ Acknowledgment of Debt to British Seamen Fund, and is chairman of the trustees of Flock House.
Mr. Daniel Reese is a Christchurch merchant. He was born in Christchurch in 1879, and received his education at the West Christchurch School and the Canterbury College School of Engineering. He served his apprenticeship at Anderson's, Christchurch, from 1894 to 1900, and was with Howard Smith's, Melbourne, from 1900 to 1903. He was at sea as a marine engineer from 1903 to 1906, trading to the Far East, the West Indies, and the Canadian and American coast. He received his chief engineer's ticket in 1906, and returned to Christchurch in the following
Mr. G. W. Reid was born at Riverton in 1886. He was educated in Wellington, where at the Terrace School and Wellington College he stood high on scholarship and prize lists, says the Dunedin “Star.” He graduated from Victoria University College as Bachelor of Commerce, and obtained an honours pass in the accountancy professional examinations. His wife, herself a graduate of Victoria College (in Arts), is a daughter of the late Mr. C. A. Strack, who was well known in educational circles and was manager of the Court of Education at the big Exhibition
New Zealand's Finest Railway Station.
(Rly. Publicity photo.)
A recent view of the new station at Auckland, shewing the forecourt with its gardens and lawns and ornamental masonry.
Wit and Humour
A dear old lady had returned from her first visit to France. “What impressed you most?” she was asked.
“Well,” she replied, after a moment or two's thought, “I think it was the French pheasants singing the mayonnaise.”
* * *
Mrs. Murphy was the proud possessor of twin boys, and whilst taking them out in the park, ran across her neighbour, Mrs. Casey.
“Arrah,” said the latter, “an’ it's a perfect pair o’ boys they are; but tell me, how do you manage to tell one from the other? For divil a bit of difference can I see between them.”
Her friend smiled as she rocked her children to and fro in their monster pram.
“Ah,” she replied, “it's quite easy, for, you see, little Mike has a tooth comin’ up and Tim hasn't. So I put my finger in Tim's mouth, an’ if he bites, why, then, it's Mike.”
* * *
“Yes, sir, I believe big wars are often caused by the smallest matters,” ruminated Old Man Jones. “Things that a fellow thinks don't amount to a darn will sometimes pile up a mountain of trouble. Why, just the other night my wife was working over a crossword puzzle and she looked up and said, ‘What's a female sheep?’ And I said, ‘Ewe.’ And there was another big war on.”
Teacher: “How many wars was Spain engaged in during the seventeenth century?”
Tommy: “Seven, sir.”
Teacher: “Seven? Please enumerate them.”
Tommy: “One, two, three, four, five, six, seven.”
* * *
A small boy called on the doctor one evening. “Say, Doctor, I've got the measles, but I can keep it quiet.”
The doctor looked up, puzzled, and finally asked the boy what he meant by that.
“Oh!” suggested the small patient, “What'll you give me to go to school and scatter it among all the rest of the kids?”
Looking Back into the Future.
“Goin’ away, Mike?”
“I am that!”
“Well, if it's the next train ye're afther catchin’ ye've just missed it!”
Current Comments
Mr. Charles H. Dickson, Art Editor of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Co's. Magazine, writes from Mt. Royal Station, Baltimore, M.D., in enthusiastic terms regarding the cover design of our magazine for June of last year. The design was a conception of Mr. Stanley Davis, supervising artist of the N.Z. Railway Advertising Studios. It was entitled “Time,” and had reference to the football issue brought out in connection with the British v. New Zealand test matches. The same cover was used for last month's issue, and shewed the crowds surging across the playing field between the goalposts, the only portion which they had not invaded being in the shape of New Zealand.
Mr. Dickson's letter was as follows:—
“There has come into my hands just a few days ago, the June issue of your outstanding magazine for 1930.
“As art editor of our own publication, I want here to thank the ‘God of things as they ought to be’ for even the existence of such works, though my eyes may not regularly be blessed with the sight of them.
“My enthusiasm has been especially kindled with the splendid cover design. I cannot discover whom to thank for this gem of an idea nor for its masterly execution, but I would like to convey my opinion that it is utterly satisfactory and the flower of some nobly organized intellect. To have woven such a setting and such a national significance into one gripping picture is achievement almost enough for a lifetime. It is the most arresting ‘front’ certainly of the whole year, and perhaps in a decade, and this from one with a life devotion to this subject.”
Referring to the Hawke's Bay earthquake, the South African Railways and Harbours Magazine writes as follows:—
“Railways, the world over, hold a high reputation for their work in times of such emergency, and the railways of New Zealand, from full particulars just to hand, manfully upheld that reputation. It might well be argued that in such a pass the railways (particularly when they are State-owned) owe their complete assistance as a duty and not as a common charity. However that may be, it was more than mere duty that made New Zealand railwaymen rush relief trains to the afflicted area in record time and restore a regular service over the contorted ground in approximately forty-eight hours, thus hastening the evacuation of the refugees and the injured.
“Behind these achievements, we believe, there was something of the tradition that inspires railwaymen of every clime—a tradition which says that a break in the lines must be repaired with frantic speed, that their charges must be delivered safely in any circumstances, and that, no matter how great the personal sacrifice, or how gigantic the work involved, ‘the trains must run.’ The railwayman has to meet disaster with herculean efforts to effect recuperation; oft-times he has to come as near as it is humanly possible to the performance of miracles; and he seldom rests until he hears the sweet words, ‘normal running resumed.’”
In his present contribution, our Special London Correspondent makes interesting reference to the recommendations of the Automatic Train Control Committee, whose report on signalling in relation to the safety of train travel, was issued recently. He also gives his usual review of current developments on the railways of Great Britain and the Continent.
The introduction, in recent years, of clever signalling devices of one kind and another, has resulted in a marked increase in travel safety. Power signalling and the employment of day colour light signals are two noteworthy developments in this important field, while the greater use being made of automatic train control systems is minimising the risk of accident. This form of protection is being closely studied by the Home railways, and the recently issued report of the Automatic Train Control Committee, set up by the Minister of Transport three years ago, is full of interest for railwaymen the world over.
In the course of its investigations, this Committee has held no fewer than seventy general meetings and examined hundreds of witnesses including railway operating and locomotive officers, inspectors, drivers, trade union leaders, and manufacturing representatives. After reviewing the various systems of automatic train control, the Committee expresses the opinion that progressive action is desirable for increasing security against accident due to failures of enginemen to observe or correctly interpret signals. They believe that best protection may be secured by the employment of a simple type of automatic control, and by improvements in the conditions under which enginemen work traffic, more especially in respect of lighting and sighting of signals.
To ensure absolute safety, the Committee believe it desirable to provide automatic control at the majority of distant signals and at selected stop signals. For semaphore distant signals, where direct control is desirable, the use of a fixed track ramp and locomotive plunger is recommended. In the case of stop signals (which may be misread by enginemen) used for the protection of trains, starting from or booked to stop, or perform shunting duties at important junctions, stations, or block posts, control at distant signals is of no avail. Protection at selected stop signals is in many such instances desirable. At locations such as these, the Committee recommends the use of a control trip or device of suitable type, catch points or derailers, trap points (with or without sand drags), or detonator placers.
Various types of automatic train control are employed on the Home railways, a leader in this endeavour being the Great
For Branch Line Passenger Movement.
Latest type of L. & N.E.R. “Sentinel Cammell” articulated steam rail car used on the Home Railways.
The system gives to the driver audible warning of the state of the signal, and in the event of a danger signal being passed, automatically stops the train before it reaches the next signal. In practice the audible warning is given to the driver when his train is approaching a distant signal in the danger position. In the event of this warning being disregarded, the brakes are automatically applied so as to ensure the train being pulled up before the next stop signal is reached. Another and distinctive audible indication is provided on the locomotive when the distant signal shows “line clear.” For the indication “signal at danger” a siren is sounded, and for the indication “line clear” a bell is rung. The apparatus fixed to the track for operating the audible signals consists of an immovable ramp, forty feet long, placed between the running rails, taking the form of a steel inverted T-bar mounted on a baulk of timber. At its highest point the ramp is four inches above rail level, and it is connected with a switch in the signalbox attached to a lever controlling the distant signal. On the locomotive there is affixed a contact shoe, an electrically-controlled brake valve and siren combined, and an electric bell. The contact shoe is secured on the centre line of the locomotive, projecting to within two and a half inches above rail level.
Steam and petrol-driven rail-cars are a big success in handling branch lines business, although it would be well to bear in mind that, as a result of the growth of the highway motor and the increasing likelihood of branch-line train services being superseded by railway-operated road motor vehicles, the rail motor car cannot seriously be regarded as an absolutely permanent piece of railway equipment. For some years to come there will doubtless be useful openings for the rail motor car, so that the recent move of thé London and North Eastern Railway
The new L. & N.E. rail car is of “Sentinel-Cammell” make, and consists of two cars mounted in articulated fashion on three bogies. The motive power is furnished by two 100–125 horse-power engines, one driving the axle of the leading bogie, and the other the trailing axle of the articulated bogie. Gear ratios provide for speeds of 30 or 38 miles per hour at 500 revolutions per minute, the engines, thus being capable of attaining
A Typical Modern Passenger Carriage.
Composite (First and Third class) side corridor coach, Great Western Railway, England.
While the Home railways, like those of New Zealand, remain loyal to the conventional form of steam and petrol rail car, in Germany a more ambitious line is being taken by developing rail cars driven by aeroplane engines and propellers. The first car of this unique type has been put into service at Hanover, and in its initial trials it attained a speed of 95 miles an hour.
The machine has been built by Herr Kruckenberg, in association with the German Railways, and in exterior appearance the car resembles an airship on rails. A blunt nose contains the driver's compartment, and the silver stream-lined vehicle is 85 feet long. Two running wheels are provided at either end, and an aeroplane four-bladed propeller is situated at the rear. The body is of steel tubing covered with sheet aluminium, the total weight of the car being about 18 1/2 tons. Passenger windows run the full length of the body, and a central entrance door gives access to two compartments, one smoking and the other nonsmoking. The aeroplane engine which forms the means of propulsion is of 500 horse-power. Accessory machinery, an air compressor supplying air pressure, and two electric generators charging the accumulator battery, are driven by the aeroplane motor. This is arranged in the arched fore-point of the car, feeding the lighting and compressor plant and supplying the current for an electric motor which drives the car when the main drive motor is out of action. Two independent braking devices are installed —an external compression brake operated
In main-line working, the problem of handling heavier trains with existing locomotive equipment is often a difficult one. Faced with the question of everincreasing loads the Paris-Orleans Railway of France has just put in hand the interesting work of rebuilding several of its “Pacific” locomotives with a view to augmenting their power.
The Orleans locomotives had a relatively large grate area (4.27 square metres), but they were not altogether
A Passenger Train of World Renown.
London-Cornwall “Atlantic Coast Express” on the Southern Railway, South Western Main Line, England.
Interesting Exhibits.
Modestly tucked away under a glass cover in the Railway Museum at York, and in the midst of a hundred and one relics of the old days of travel, is the single object whose passing brings its own note of regret (says a writer in the London Star).
The faded oblong strip of paper, is a fourth-class railway ticket from Scotland, and recalls the days when thrifty folk could economise by travelling in railway trucks, seated on the floor, without protection against wind or rain.
This ticket is only one of the scores of curios relating to the transport of bygone days and which have been collected and housed in the Railway Museum.
The whole history of the locomotive is reflected in the collection, which is the most interesting of its kind in the world.
The visitor is reminded, first of all, of the days when a guard sat aloft on the carriages at the back of the train and waved a flag. Here are his goggles and red coat.
In this storehouse of memories are old prints of early railway scenes, and cartoons reminiscent of early railway history.
There are examples of historic engines and—joy of the schoolboys’ heart—the very tools with which George Stephenson worked and made his first models.
To the little building near the Railway Institute, hundreds of schoolboys come every year to spend many happy hours looking over the earliest examples of railway engineering.
And the keenest visitors are not always children, for among the people of the north is a natural aptitude, or “turn,” as they would say, for things mechanical.
While the southerner is concerned only with the fact that a steam-engine goes, the more inquiring citizen of the north seeks to know why it goes.
Here under one roof are gathered objects which unfold eloquently the history of transport in the past century.
Most of them were collected for the occasion of the Railway Centenary, which took place in Darlington in 1922. During the nine years which have elapsed since, valuable additions have been made to the collection.
Passengers to-day who are in the habit of grumbling at the discomfort and inconvenience of railway travel have only to look upon some of the open-air railway coaches in use in days gone by to realise how much their well-being is studied in 1931.
Few of the first-class habitues would care to travel even in the elegant “Royal Railroad Carriage” shewn in one picture of Queen Victoria and her consort.
In this work of art, the Queen and Prince Albert are depicted with “a few of the Royal children” and two ladies-in-waiting.
In spite of the excellent view of Windsor Castle shewn in the background and the upholstering in red and gold, the Royal party is seen seated with expressions of some restraint.
One of the most interesting objects is the end of a guard's van fitted with a communication cord.
In those days the cord ran outside the carriage windows, so that anyone who had occasion to use it had to cross the carriage, let down the window, lean out, and grope for the cord.
Years ago many of the third-class carriages were open to the sky, and there is
The museum has its own little “chamber of horrors.” Here are forged bank notes and coins, and other curious relics.
To be found in the museum are also several authentic examples of the first iron roads which were made for wheels without flanges.
There is a splendid and genuine portion of the old Outram way, laid down by Outram himself, the father of the “tram,” in 1797. This was brought down from the L.N.E.R.'s Peak Forest Canal, near Chinley.
The permanent-way and rail sections shew the growth in the size and efficiency, of rails from 1830 onwards, and include the smallest rail, which was used on the Leeds and Selby line, and which was 36lb. to the yard.
The pride of the collection is the Hetton engine, built at Hetton Colliery workshops in 1822 by Geo. Stephenson and Nicholas Wood.
It was rebuilt in 1857 and again in 1882, and is said to have been working right up till 1913.
In the Railway Centenary Procession of old and modern locomotives in 1922 the Hetton engine led the way—under its own steam!
An Express Flyer On The Eastern Bengal Railway, India.
Darjeeling mail train at Sealdah, Calcutta. This train weighs 527 tons, and is hauled by a Class XB engine weighing 155 tons.
Many other famous engines have been found and consigned to honourable retirement in the museum.
Letters in the handwriting of Stephenson, L. I. K. Brunel, George Hudson and other giants of the early days of railway transport have also been collected and stored in this treasure-house of railway relics.
“The smoking compartment of a train is a means of obtaining a liberal education. It is a sort of moving university, where everything is discussed, from the mining industry to the immortality of the soul.”— Canadian National Railways Magazine.
“
Idols of Hearts and of Households.”—Dickens.
(Rly. Publicity photos.)
Our Children's Gallery.—(1) Crissie and Stewart Franklyn; (2) Les, Bryan and Ray O'Connor; (3) Dennis and Ivor Wright; (4) Bruce Creed; (5) Lurline Burgess; (6) June Parris; (7) Joan Kelly; (8) James Rankin; (9) Betty and Frances Laley and Vina Dalgleish; (10) Ivy and Bobble Donaldson; (11) Ownen and Margaret McKenzie; (12) David Hutchison; (13) Eileen Williams; (14) Nola Haining; (15) Donaid Gibury.
James Cowan
After the visitor to the Rotorua Wonderland has seen the geysers and the hot springs, there remain the lakes and their beautiful shores and forests and the Maori life, and these features of the Wai-Ariki country are as attractive to many people as the thermal sights. In this article Mr. Cowan describes the pleasure of cruising and camping on Rotorua and Rotoiti, and the unusual interest of Mokoia Island, the Lakeland Holy Isle. (The illustrations accompanying the article have been reproduced from paintings by the late Mr. T. Ryan.)
Campers-out and fishermen are early risers. They need no daylight-saving legislation to rouse them out of their blankets at peep of dawn. Whether we sleep in a tent or in the good open air—and a tent is over-stuffy for my liking, and unnecessary in fine summer weather—there are many things that lull one to sound slumber. The soothing wawarawai, murmur of gently-lapping water on the beach, or the music of a cascade rising and falling on the night wind; little wandering breaths of air; scent of treebark and ferns and moss; the call of a night bird, sometimes the trill of the cricket; to my fancy, lying ear to ground, the vast inarticulate lullaby of Mother Earth herself as she spins on her eternal course all blend into the healthy opiate of dreamless sleep. But the camper's sub-conscious mind is alert to the first signs and sounds of awakening day; a louder note in the ripple-wash on the sands; a breezy stir in the trees above the bivouac; a shivery breath from the grey waters; the raw freshness of the world when nature yawns and stretches herself against the dawn.
It still wanted an hour or more to sunrise when Tamarahi and I stirred out of our blankets on Matariki beach, our snug camping place on the north-west corner of Mokoia Island, and made ready for the second leg of our boating cruise around the lakes, a long projected sail in company from Ohinemutu to Mokoia and then down through the Ohau Channel and around the many bays of Rotoiti. The morning star was dimmed by a little haze that floated above us; the water of Rotorua stretched grey and cold to the dim further shore.
“Night's candles are burnt out and jocund day
“Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops.”
Weather-wise Tamarahi had a look around at sky and lake, and when I suggested breakfast before we started he shook his head. “Better wait till we get to the Ohau,” he said; “the wind is getting up; let's start now before there's much sea on the bar yonder.”
So, rolling up our flax sleeping mats and blankets—we didn't trouble about a tent on those simple-life camping cruises—we stowed our camp-gear under the thwarts, launched our boat, stepped the mast and set sail for the Ohau rivermouth three miles away. Our boat was a sixteenfooter, with a spritsail; small canvas, but, as it turned out, quite enough for our needs that cruise.
Once well clear of the mountain-island the westerly breeze caught us, and away we ran before it, sliding along at an
kai, and maybe another day's fishing with those long funnel-shaped hao-koura, the nets stretched on poles to dry on the creamy sand.
That was the beginning of a long-ago cruise with a capital Maori mate, sailing or paddling from bay to bay, making the acquaintance of the small communities of the Ngati-Pikiao tribe who lived in the lovely indents of Rotoiti's in-and-out coast, camping where we listed, exploring little silent islands, and the grand old Maori forests. What glimpses of charm we had of wild life around the lakes! We came silently upon the wild duck and the weweiia, the little dabchicks, and the teal in the quiet waters; we even surprised a melancholy bittern fishing on the Ohau banks. Our sail easily wafted us along, and when the wind dropped and we had to take to the oars we moved almost as silently, so that we seemed to enter naturally into an intimacy with the things of Nature. In a noisy-power-launch we would have missed all those curiously confidential touches of the wilds.
There are some almost faery places about Rotoiti. There are some tiny lovely dots of vegetation seemingly floating on the lake; there are two islets, as pretty as a picture, with their flax bushes and shrubs and dangling creepers and flowers all mirrored in the smooth waters on days of halcyon calm. There is a rocky isle, Pateko, half-way down the lake, a place of legend and elegiac poem. Long ago it was a fort and a refuge; nowadays it is the burial place of the small hapus who live on the nearby southern shore of Rotoiti. Every little bay has its shining crescent of sand; and on the grassy terraces near the east end of the lake there are settlements with here and there a carved house.
The trail of modern progress is over most of those villages, but the communal house of meeting retains the old style, artistic in form, blending well with the landscape.
The northern shores are very bold in parts, with their cliffs, pohutukawa-hung, rising from deep water, and the steep hillsides densely wooded to the skyline. Matawhaura mountain makes a grand finale to the procession of cliff and forest and glinting bays and beach. We can bring up close under this giant palisade of rock and look up through the branches to the heights eight hundred feet above. Fern trees droop their lovely frondage high up the rocky sides; mosses and lichens and all kinds of fragrant climbing things tenderly tapestry the precipice, and little springs and dew-like drips water the many-coloured vegetation that so closely mats the cliffs. And far above, reached by a secret trail—it must be a perilous trail too—is the immemorial cavern of the dead, where generations of Tamarahi's ancestors rest.
Hauparu, Wai-iti, Ruato, Tapuwaekura, Tapuwaeharuru, Otaramarae, and here and there smaller hamlets still we
pohutukawa tree, at the foot of a hillside on the south side of the lake, and fills three successive bathing pools on its way to the lake. The lowermost of these was formerly used by people temporarily under the mystic quarantine of tapu. Manupirua is still in Maori hands, it is the little arcadian spa of the Ngati-Pikiao tribe.
“
The rain is o'er—How densely bright
Yon pearly clouds reposing lie … !”—Andrew Norton.
Clouds dispersing after rain, Lake Rotorua and Mokoia Island.
There is a most lovely forest road, lovelier even than famous Hongi's Track—where by the way, the widening and straightening operations of the roadmakers in the interest of hurry-on motorists have robbed the route of much of its olden charm. This is a three-mile road from Ruato, on the south side of Rotoiti, to the northern end of Lake Okataina. It passes through a noble forest of rimu pines and other great trees, the bush called Waione. For most of the distance from lake to lake the ground is level, once you climb up from Ruato to the Waione plateau, and the road is a cool fragrant avenue quite overshadowed by the foliage of the most beautiful trees in the Maori forest. It is a glorious bit of the real unspoiled bush and long may it remain so.
And it is the gateway to a wonder-place of quiet waters and luxuriant tree-life; that vast mountainside of pohutukawa trees on the western side of Okataina is something that no other lakeshore can show, not even Rotoiti, fine as it is.
A few days spent in exploring the historic places and the slopes and hilltops of Mokoia Island was a perfect finish to a Lakeland cruise on which not a lakeside village was left unvisited. That leisurely voyage was rich in memories of beauty; it produced, too, sundry notebooks filled with Maori legendary and poetic data, gathered from the last of the old tattooed warriors and sages of the lakes.
But weeks instead of days could be spent on Mokoia, or rather could in the days of the past, for the old well-schooled people who were such mines of folk-lore and song have gone and the young generation will not live on the ancient isle of ghosts, remote from the cinema and the jazz hall. Thirty to forty years ago many families lived on that wonderfully productive Paepaerau Flat, on the northeast side of the island. What a garden of food it was! And it could be a garden of food again, for the volcanic soil is amazingly rich, and frosts and blights never afflict Mokoia.
When food was scarce on the mainland, the tribes always had Mokoia to fall back on for potatoes, kumara and maize.
What a fruitful place it was when first I set foot on the Paepaerau beach! There were cultivations all over the levels and up along the lower slopes; and up yonder were the cherry-groves, richly laden. One summer I was at Rotorua, old Te Raiha brought over canoe-load after canoe-load of kits of cherries, for the township fruit shops and the hotels and boarding houses.
There were many canoes in use then; every village around the lake had its little flotilla of dug-outs; it was a pretty sight to see three or four of the largest wakas from Mokoia bound for Ohinemutu on some fine summer day, with sail set, making a race of it across the sparkling lake before a beautiful north-east breeze. Long ago they used raupo-reed sails, closely interwoven, very light material; but in my day at Rotorua the popular sailcloth was flourbags, which were deftly cut to shape and sewn with a sackneedle.
Here on this happy little island with its contented industrious community I heard several haka songs extolling the fertility and fruitfulness of the soil and the abundance of food from land and lake. These were often chanted by a merry company of girls and women as they came carrying baskets of food to visitors at a feast. One I have translated thus:—
Here there is a reference to the abundance of whitebait or inanga, which was caught in great quantities in the old days, in fine-meshed nets, before the voracious trout became plentiful. The inanga was dried and preserved in taha, or calabashes—the hue and vegetable gourd—and in bark containers. Koura or crayfish too were in plenty, and there were scores, in fact hundreds, of posts sunk in the shallow lake bed as mooring places for the nets. They catch koura there still, in many places, each of which has its special name and its owners.
One day I climbed to the top of Mokoia with my friend Tutanekai the tounga, a lineal descendant of Hinemoa and Tutanekai of romantic memory. We pushed up by overgrown tracks, where the ancient homes of man are covered with shrubs and flax bushes; past the earthworks of immemorial forts, along little gullies and through witchy thickets. My companion pointed out this tapu place and that, and told how in the long ago this fruitful isle was “covered with people.” On the open breezy summit we came to a little square redoubt-like enclosure, nearly six hundred feet above the lake. It was once a fort, now a burial place. Tutanekai gave its name, which translated is “The Pinnacle of the Place of Abundant Food.” The name giver of ancient days likened the whole island to a great pile of food. What a picture from that green and lofty lookout! The lake lay all round us, as smooth as if polished. Ferny and wooded spurs radiated from our citadel down to the bright waters. Blue ranges rimmed the skyline; we saw the glimmer of little lakes; the woolly, curly steam columns of far away, and four miles south across the lake the white
It was hot on this hilltop; Tutanekai and I presently sought the shade of the small woods on the south side, and loafed there awhile in great content, and the learned man told some of the tales of old. How sweet a retreat this day, so near and yet so far from the busy spa town:—
Beauty of landscape all around. But the feature of Mokoia's life and scenery and atmosphere that has always impressed me most is a certain mystic quality, its air of tapu over all. The stories and histories I heard from this old man, and that—men who were born on the Island and would die and be buried there—show that Mokoia is in very truth a place saturated with the mystery that comes of centuries of human life on one small spot, and with the genius loci of primitive man. Long ago it was named Te Motutapu-a-Tinirau, after a South Sea sacred island famed in tradition. It is still the very home and citadel of tapu.
“…
where the raptured eye hurries from joy to joy.”—Thomson.
The West End of Lake Rotoiti, North Island New Zealand.
So lovely a place should not be so deserted, but I hope it will never pass out of Maori hands.
Paepaerau village could be made a home of the ancient race typically and distinctively Maori, preserving all the ancient forms of architecture and art-craftmanship and cultivation, with canoes on the beach as when I first saw it. So preserved, it would be the most attractive thing in Lakeland, a retreat to which all the pakeha's sordid and blatant modernity would not be admitted. It is a natural sanctuary. The stone images of the old gods are preserved there still—one is on view to the pakeha, the others are buried. That ancient atua Matua-tonga, the mauri or talisman of the kumara gardens, symbolises the aura of sanctity which permeates the sland. The Motu-tapu-a-Tinirau with its Maori twilight story should be as classic a place to us as ever Mount Olympus was in the golden age of Greece.
New Zealand Railways Road Motor Services
(Rly. Publicity photos.)
Portion of the Department's fleet of buses in the Wellington-Hutt suburban service. This service carried 2,671,511 passengers during the year ended 31st March, 1931.
The following is the fourth instalment of the text of a little booklet explanatory of the services and facilities of the New Zealand Railways, recently issued by the Railways Publicity Branch and distributed to all schools throughout the Dominion.
Although the people of New Zealand own the railways, the great majority of them may not know how far the very cheap railway freight helps to make the country prosperous.
The Piper's Son Up-to-Date.
The average distance that a ton of goods is hauled by rail is 66 miles.
By reason of these concessions and others, the railway revenue does not pay the full interest on loan capital, but the account could be squared if the average charge for the whole of the goods traffic, were raised from 2.32d. to 2.89d, (over 2 3/4d.) a mile per ton.
That easy way to make a railway profit has not been taken, because extra charges on the low rate goods could affect the prosperity of important industries and thus injure the public welfare.
(To be continued.)
A. Oman Heany
Signalling trains on the New Zealand Railways.
A Circle of red light gleaming out of the darkness like a drop of ghost's blood—or a bright, green eye, as of “a little yellow god.” These are the two signs that the enginedriver, peering round the hood of his rocking cabin, watches for keenly as his long train whirls on over the miles of iron track that run along the skirts of night.
Is it the green orb showing? Then onward it is, with a little less steam, a little less tension. The end of the home run is in sight for the driver, with the mouthwatering prospect of a bacon-and-eggs supper, a pipe of peace and a peep at the youngsters in bed. Back in the carriages the passengers yawn and prepare their luggage. All is well.
But is it the red light showing? Shut off steam, put on the brakes, slow down to a stop. What's wrong? Well, whatever has happened, the green light will show up soon, as if the little god has suddenly devoured the owner of the red eye, and is sitting up on the signal-post there, winking. No danger so long as the train stays still. That bright red eye is a word of command. The stationary engine belches steam like an angry dragon, but there is a greater power in its path, and it must stay still. A passenger who stops a train without good reason does so at risk of a heavy penalty, but that red light is exempt. It is the first and the last word.
Signals, those two lights; spread in profusion along the railway lines of New Zealand, detailed to guard the approaches to each and every station in the country, efficient, silent, conscientious, unsleeping sentries whose challenge may not be denied, whose “pass, friend” is never given without real assurance. Simple in themselves, they are but the marionettes that respond to the strings of a guiding power; they are the outward symbols of that cool, watchful police department of the railways.
(Rly. Publicity photo.)
“All Clear Ahead.”
Those signals never work haphazardly, they are never confused, uncertain or at fault. The lives and property that depend upon their proper functioning are too valuable to be left to chance. That is why the signal system of the New Zealand railways is—“Perfect.”
The signalman said it for me, as I sat in his elevated cabin at Thorndon Station and watched him at work.
“But there is a philosopher who says that nothing in life is perfect,” I observed.
“A philosopher? Well, I'll bet he wasn't a railway signalman, or he wouldn't have said it.”
Thirty-six tall, shining levers stood up out of the floor like a row of rifles. The cabin might almost have been a sniping nest. Out there through the glass windows, dotted over the black, murky crisscrossed railway yard, with its coal-holes and its no-man's-land, were the signal-posts—fourteen of them. All of them within sight, just in case something goes wrong. Not that it will. That philosopher we mentioned, you know, didn't know much about railways —–
Now, watch. Down comes one of those block levers to set the points as the signalman pulls on it, then a blue to lock them, then a red, and—down comes the arm of that far signal, as if struck by a fatal shot. Now down with a couple of those black levers for the points, and a blue one for the lock bars, or a blue-and-black lever to work points and lock bars in one operation.
The way is clear, the road is set. Come on, you big puffing iron monster—you're a tank for which your unfailing sniper has cleared the way. Come on proudly with a roll of iron and a burst of steam.
Great shooting (if you will pardon the fantasy). Mysterious shooting. Every time the signalman pulls down a red lever he picks off one of those fourteen signal arms as clean as a whistle. And, far away, the points and the lock-bars on the railway lines jump to his distant command. Like the pieces of a cardboard puzzle being moved miraculously into place.
“Yes, but what about the element of human error?” I asked, without any tact whatever. “What if you pull down the wrong lever?”
The signalman smiled.
“That is just what you can't do Watch.”
He pulled down certain levers to set
(Rly. Publicity photo.)
Departure from Wellington of the New Plymouth Express.
“Checkmate,” I murmured.
“You see, that particular lever doesn't belong to the set I'm using now,” explained my companion. “It automatically checks me if I make a mistake. Locking system below this cabin. No lever will work except in its own set. Sort of trades unionism, you see. Anyway, that eliminates the element of human error.”
Signalling Methods on the N.Z.R.
(Rly. Publicity photo.)
Exchanging tablets, Thorndon Signal-box, Wellington.
“Fine. But,” I pursued, relentlessly, “what if you have a train stationary at the Thorndon dock, and, forgetting that fact, you carefully set the track and allow an incoming train to come in on top of the other?” “Under the automatic system that is impossible,” was the reply, “because as long as a train is on a main line like that, the line is automatically locked against the entry of another train. Electrification. Until the one train is clear, the signal remains at danger, and I couldn't move the signal to ‘safety’ if I tried.”
The signalman, between explanations and demonstrations, was continually pulling his levers backward and forward. He put a netted cloth over the shining ends to get a grip, and each time pressed on an electric button release with his foot. The noise gave me time to think out new points of attack. I had thought at first that I might be criminally diverting the signalman's attention at such a busy time, but now I was comforted by the reflection that he couldn't go wrong, anyway. However, I turned to the maintenance man who had come in and divided my questions between the two.
“Now, what if an incoming train is set on a wrong track?” “Quite safe. One would never be able to switch a train on to that line unless it was clear.”
“But what is to prevent a train coming along a converging line from the shunting yard and colliding with a train on the main line?”
“The manner in which the points are arranged would not allow it. The setting of a main line automatically closes up converging lines. Points are dependent on others.
“But you have a lot of lines in this yard. Could not a head-on collision occur?”
“No. Again the points are so arranged that trains travelling in different directions on the one line would be carried to safety on different lines upon reaching the points.”
I saw my chance and leapt to it like a tiger.
“That is all very well for double tracks, Mr. Signalman, but what about a Single track?”
Controlling The Movement Of Trains.
(Rly. Publicity photo.)
Signalmen on duty at Frankton Junction Signal-box, Auckland Province.
My companion did not blink an eyelid. For a moment I pitied him. Then I pitied myself, because he said: “The automatic system divides the railway line into sections of quarters of a mile. That system serves the Hutt. Upon a train entering a section it automatically places the signals at both ends of the section at danger. That holds up a train that may be waiting at either end to come on, thus preventing collision in the front or at the back. Opposing trains then cross on a loop line at the end of the section at which they meet.”
I felt I was playing a game of draughts and was losing all my men. However, I perceived what I thought was a loophole.
“That is a safeguard which applies only to the electrified railway,” I said. “The Palmerston North line is not electrified. How about the danger of collision on that?”
“Ah, there we operate on the tablet system.”
I had an idea of what he meant. Tablets were those composition discs that engine-drivers exchanged with signalmen at stations, not unlike the pleasant swopping of cigarette cards. It had always appeared to me to be a happy and aimless pastime, bound up with the curious legend I had heard that no driver would travel without his disc. I was to learn why.
The signalman showed me a tablet machine against the wall. He pressed on one brass button, which he said rang a bell in the railway office at Ngaio, away up in the hills. In code he asked permission to issue a tablet from his own machine for an outward-bound train. Had there been a train between Ngaio and Thorndon he would have had to wait. But there was none, so the Ngaio man,
He tied it to its carrier, set the inter-locked starting signal and handed the tablet to the driver of the train as it passed by the cabin. Not until that tablet arrived at Ngaio could another tablet be extracted from the electric machine at either station, and so no other train could travel until the one was clear.
And if that system failed ? There were two provisions—authorisation by a set of five telegrams instead of a tablet, or the appointment of a railway man to act as a pilot. (“Any more questions?”)
The maintenance man showed me on a chart the manner in which certain points on the tracks locked others, thus reducing danger to vanishing point. The chart gave one a brain storm to look at, leave alone work out.
I gave it up. I had done my best to find a loophole, but had failed. There seemed to be no possibility of accident unless an engine-driver mistook the green and red lights, or the arms, of the signals. That left a small enough chance of error.
426
Miles in 14 1/2 Hours.
(Rly. Publicity photo.)
The Limited Express from Auckland approaching Thorndon Station, Wellington.
I left the signalman in his cabin working the levers incessantly, protected against error, provided with an alternative to everything, setting tracks for 180 odd trains a day, eating his lunch with one hand, still fascinated by his job after years at the game.
That philosopher who said nothing was perfect—well, I would just like him to visit that signal box for half-an-hour.
Small Appropriation Brings Big Returns.
How £200 spent on advertising brought additional revenue at the rate of £7,000 a year was told in a recent issue of the L.N.E.R. Magazine. The advertisements were inserted to make known some improved services on a section of the London and North-Eastern Railway, and resulted in an average monthly increase of 33,426 passengers and £596 revenue. In commenting on this result the writer said: “The knowledge of this cheaper travel could only have been gained by perusal of L.N.E.R. advertisements.”
The “Golden Strand,” Samoa.
A scene on the Coast at Molonui, shewing a native village nestling among the cocoanut trees.
(Written for the “New Zealand Railways Magazine” by
C. E. Wheeler
This is a travel article wherein railways will not appear. It deals with Fiji, Tonga (the Friendly Islands) and Western Samoa, and describes a holiday sea trip, nearly four thousand miles in extent, introducing the New Zealander to an entirely new and unique environment. The photographs accompanying this article were taken by the writer.
Only a few days steam northwards from Auckland, on the Tofua, we sight a bold headland, backed by a volcanic peak rising 3,000 feet, and wooded to the top. This is Mount Washington, on Kandava Island, an outlying part of the Crown Colony of Fiji. Some hours later, and we are alongside the wharf in the modern port of Suva, and fresh impressions pile up vividly from that moment for the next few weeks.
Fiji presents a mixed medley of peoples, and the Indians are overhauling the Fijians in numbers. Fifty years ago the natives numbered 115,000, but today their total is 91,000, while the Indian section has a much higher birth rate.
In Suva town, just off its main thoroughfare, is a “Street of All Nations,” where you will see the Chinaman and the Indian carrying on business with an application which the Fijian despises. Here are the Indian craftsmen in silver, squatting on the floor of an untidy little shop, anvil between their toes, fashioning the heavy silver bangles and chains without which the Indian woman would feel the inferiority complex. Rising to further heights of display, a lady whose husband can afford it will wear a bright half sovereign pinned into the nostril. At the street intersection, controlling traffic with great dignity and composure, is a tall Ghurka policeman—a proportion of the police in Fiji are of that race. There are good roads on the main island of Viti Levu, in which Suva is situated, and the visitor has ample facilities for travelling around in good motors. Native life presents many interesting aspects, and the views from the hills at the back of Suva, with luxuriant tropical growth in the foreground, and the sea pictures beyond, are a constant delight to those unaccustomed to such sights.
To the South East, as far from Suva as Auckland is from Wellington, we come to the southern portion of the Friendly Islands, landing in Nukualofa, the capital, on a brilliantly fine Sunday morning, and straightaway make for the nearest church. We had heard of the wonderful singing of the Tongans, and as we approach the church there rolls out a splendid sonorous volume of song. It is hard to believe that the singing is not assisted by a grand organ, but in actual fact the deep rich notes which suggest it are those of the Tongan men. Our early pilgrimage to church is prompted by the knowledge that services begin at 5 a.m. and are almost continuous till lunch, and that there are no regular evening services. A
Enthusiastic missionaries declare that the Tongans are the most religious people in the world. Sunday in Nukualofa is strictly kept, and no good Tongan would venture to play a jazz record on the gramophone on that day. Nor would he pick a flower, so it is said. Sabbath observance is enforced by a strict set of laws.
The fairy-like entrance to Swallows’ Cave, Vavau.
“There's running water — beautiful streams over there!” he remarked in longing tones. And one realised his feelings when he explained that not in all Tongatabu was there running water. We have to be without this common feature of a New Zealand landscape to understand how much it means in one's life.
Every Tongan male at the age of sixteen is entitled to an area of land bearing cocoanuts and capable of easy cultivation. He also gets a town section, and both are his while he pays the modest annual tax. By its unique land system, and thanks to a highly fertile climate, the Tongan is thus rendered independent for life. His country holding will produce not only all the most important foods, but the materials of his home, built wholly from the products available in the cocoanut tree. The trunk supplies the beams and rafters, the palms a good roof, and the whole is tied together with rope spun from the fibres of the husk surrounding the nut. By means of a simple weaving operation the palms are turned into mats for the sides, capable of being let down at night, and rolled up in the daytime, so that the dwelling is comfortably cool even in a temperature of 90 in the shade.
The Tongan would not understand what we mean by the problem of living within one's income. He can get nearly all he needs for food and clothing from the land which is his inheritance as a Tongan. Money he certainly desires, though it is not essential to a well-fed existence. The cocoanut plantation is his bank. When cash is needed, the nuts are turned into copra, and are either bartered for European articles at the store, or turned into cash. With copra at bedrock price, the economic pressure so general throughout the world is felt a little by the Tongan, because he must turn out at least twice as much copra as formerly to get the usual supply of tinned
A happy care-free people, they leave their troubles to their rulers and the European officials. Though the arrival of the Tofua every month is a great island event, this does not stir them to assist in discharging cargo. The Union Company is obliged to ship about fifty Fijians from Suva at the beginning of the round trip through the South Pacific Islands for the purpose of working cargo at all ports of call, because there is no certainty otherwise that labour will be available.
Steaming northwards through the group, we pass the mysterious disappearing Falcon Island, an active volcano, which sometimes rears a mass of ashes a few hundred feet above the sea, and at other times has been only just visible above the surface. It must rise from a tremendous depth, for this is the neighbourhood of the “Tongan Deep,” where the soundings are about 23,000 feet.
Vavau, the northernmost extremity of Tonga, reminds one of the approach to Picton, for there are miles of deep sounds, with scores of pretty islands, crowded to their narrow golden beaches with the inevitable cocoanut tree, and giving glimpses of little native settlements at every turn. One of the islands is a volcanic and limestone combination, full of caves, and a trip is always arranged by the Tofua's officers to a particularly spacious and beautiful one, which easily, accommodates a launch and a ship's lifeboat. Immense stalactites, richly coloured descend from the lofty roof, and when struck with an oar they ring like gigantic bells.
Lying almost due north from Vavau, 347 miles nearer the equator, is Western Samoa, administered by New Zealanders. The two islands, Upolo and Savaii, are mountainous and well wooded.
Swallows’ Cave, Vavau, looking outwards.
One could give a long catalogue of interesting sights in Samoa, but the finest attractions of the place are the clean well ordered villages and interesting native life. Perhaps the pace of organisation has been a little too fast for the native, but evidences of good health and improved education are points to the good.
From Apia the Tofua begins the homeward run, calling again at Suva to return its labour complement. On the way is passed Niuafou Island, better known as “Tin-can Island,” because of its unique mail delivery system. Only during a few months of the year is it possible to make a safe landing on its precipitous volcanic shores, consequently a monthly exchange of news with the outside world—apart from a small wireless station maintained by the Tongan Government—has to be effected by natives swimming out to the steamer more than a mile off shore. The outward mail is carried in a tin on a stick held above the water, and the inward, more bulky, is enclosed in large biscuit tins, soldered up and provided with a light tow-rope. The Tofua is seen many miles away, and on her arrival off the main settlement, the swimmers are waiting with a cheerful hail. A few “kicks” of the screw in reverse, overboard goes the tin mail and up come the exchanges. The interesting business is over in a few minutes, and the Tofua is many miles away on the Pacific before the Niuafou swimmers reach their rock-bound shore and the little group under the cocoanut trees, waiting for the monthly mail.
“Here health, and peace, and contemplation dwell.”—Smollett.
View of Lake Rotoiti, North Island, New Zealand (about 1890), shewing the village of Mouria in the middle distance.
The Life-Blood Of A Nation.
Railways are the arteries that carry and circulate the life-blood of a nation and the publicity department was originally intended to give nourishment to this system and see that it did not become anæmic. When properly functioning the department ought to be compared with a great doctor attending to the nourishment and growth of the patient.—From the Indian Railway Magazine.
Typical Scenes In The South Sea Islands.
Top (left), The “Tin-can Mail” at Niuafou Island, letters from N.Z. being towed ashore in biscuit tins by Island swimmers; (right), Tongan Mystery Monument erected by a vanished race; (left centre), a typical Samoa village; (right centre), Tongan children who closely resemble their Maori cousins. Below (left), an island cutter within the reef at Suva; (right), a busy day on the wharf, at Suva.
By Those Who Like Us
From Mr. S. Gray, Greymouth, to the Hon. Minister of Railways, Wellington:—
I desire to place on record my appreciation of the honesty and courtesy of Railway officials during the holiday season.
A friend of mine left my attache case, containing some very valuable articles, in the midnight Christ-church-bound train, recently. He alighted at Rolleston, assuring me that the case was in his possession, but after events showed this to be incorrect. The case was not locked, not labelled, nor did it contain my address.
Immediately after becoming aware of my loss I made enquiries of the Stationmasters at Rolleston and Springfield and they kindly telephoned other stations notifying them of my loss.
The attache case, with all its contents, was recovered and returned to me—thanks to the honesty of the Guard of the Christchurch train passing through Rolleston the following day.
At a time when these officials were probably working at high pressure, I regard their services as very valuable, rendered even more so by the courtesy shown by them.
* * *
From the District Commissioner of Boy Scouts for South Taranaki to the General Manager of Railways, Wellington:—
I returned from Wellington last evening by the special train which conveyed the Taranaki Scouts and Guides to attend the inspection by Lord and Lady Baden-Powell at the Basin Reserve, Wellington, and am writing on behalf of the Taranaki Scouts and Guides to express our appreciation of the liberal concession in fares that was made by your Department to enable the Scouts and Guides to travel to Wellington to meet their Chief. It was thus made possible for a party of over five hundred Scouts and Guides from Taranaki to go to Wellington, many of whom could not otherwise have afforded the trip. The whole arrangements made by the Department, both as to fares and refreshments en route, were excellent. In particular I would like to mention the very great help and courtesy we all received from the Guard, who quite excelled himself in looking after the young people and making arrangements ahead for tea and other refreshments to be available wherever required.
The whole trip was a most enjoyable one, to which your Department and staff very largely contributed.
* * *
From the Officer Commanding (Captain L. A. A. Rhodes) the 12th Battery, New Zealand Artillery, Dunedin, to the District Traffic Manager, Dunedin:—
May I take the liberty of thanking you for the most efficient way your staff dealt with the shunting operations in connection with the unloading of the horses and guns of my Battery on arrival at the Dunedin Yards. Your men were most helpful and studied us in every way, and I cannot help but voice my appreciation of the smooth manner in which everything was performed.
Ken Alexander
Human existence is not necessarily a straight line, although there are some who look upon it as a means of connecting two or more given pints; others assert that life is either straight or straitened, and that a rolling pin gathers no dough. Ethically speaking, the straight and narrow path is a “moral,” but adumbrating actual-airily it is a long lane that has no learning. A straight life-line needs no life-belt, but neither does a dead marine need a muzzle, for his shouting days are over.
A life that is more unctuous than anxious may flow with the mellifluency of an oiled octave on the zither, an icecream cone in the frigid zone, or a slippery customer in Greece; but the caretaker who gets no kicks from life gets no kick out of it. On the one hand the boot is on the other foot, and the life-line that loops the loop loopily, like the temperature chart of an Eskimo with a hoodoo on the igloo, or a cross-eyed cat in a shunting-yard, provides more variety to the running foot than macaroni.
Life is a lesson in knowing what not to know and experience is the only antidote for fake-bite. If life is not an adventure it's a sad venture, and drear at the price. After all life is after all; it is not what you make it, but what it makes you. You are either libelled or labelled, and the hand that socks the label is the hand that fools the world.
Adventure stands at every cross-road and only the dun-grey kind with the oneway mind ignore him. But the variety-artist knows what his nose knows and goes where his nose goes, for it's hinged, although apparently unhinged, and if it leads him into trouble it also teaches him the scent of it. Ruts are not made by the wheels of Destiny, but by the cart of Care, and to stick in them is to be in the cart. It is dangerous to tread the treads of temperament, follow trains of thought to the terminus, and explore the existence of existence, but it is also dangerous to take a breath of air for there are more possibilities in a lung-full of atmosphere than there are in an invitation to a meeting of the Heads in New Guinea. Days are either days or daze according to the temper of the tempter. To the tempestuous, every day is different from every other day, and no day is a mere stitch in Time. Every day is a reveille to revalues, a parade of possibilities, and a muster of the mustard. Making a “bust” of life is not making the best of it, but taking it all in all it is all or pall.
The mind is a mint and its coin is currency for the mental merchandise of man; put up the shutters and the brain is bankrupt though bursting with bullion, and the I.O.U.'s have it. Days are stringed instruments and every one strikes a different
“I wished that Dad would be his age.”
Perhaps the greatest adventure in life is that period between the ignorance of knowledge and the knowledge of ignorance, called Middle Age. In the latitude of forty, human beings become human for the first time, and realise the impotence of being earnest. Having suffered the youthful pains of Age they enjoy the soothful pæans of agelessness; for they are neither in the “jeer and callow” nor the “sere and yellow.” They neither are taken to task like Lot's wife nor shaken to ask “what's life?” They make up for the time lost in being young by being young, although no longer young. They are neither young nor old, callow nor sallow, foolish nor mulish, puerile nor senile, half-baked nor fully cooked. They pause in their flight, and for a moment call a strike against the tyrant Time. They are for the nonce as ageless as Julius Caesar's unformed thoughts and their emotions are as piquant as a pickled pin-cushion. Middle-age is neither muddle-age nor fuddle-age —it is the age of reason defying “reason”; the age when man sees himself as mothers see him; thin on top and plump beneath, slightly gone in wind and teeth, caring naught for looks or “lacks,” out to show that “tacks is tacks.”
Middle-age is the Roaring Forties when man with all sails set rounds the capabilities.
Let us lilt with the foolish fathers:—
“Keeping a tryst with Time.”
In life we are all rolling stock running on the rails of Destiny, and if we fail to stop when flagged by Fate we miss our freight. On Life's railroad there is only one set of rails and no turntable. But why turn back; the scene improves as we travel onward; or we appreciate it better; that is, those who keep their eyes to the window. But there are some who would rather sleep than peep, and some who are so occupied with their ingrown eyebrows, their over-investments and under-devestments, the price of lead-headed eye-teeth, and the fate of the fat, that they are blind to the beauty of Being. Life should be like a train—–eager, pressing forward as if bent on keeping a tryst with Time round the next bend; taking the grades sturdily, and running to Time. A train epitomizes human existence; with its black mane trailing over its shoulder it converts the Present into the Past. Every second is a chip of the Future to be caught and whirled beneath the bogies into History. Forward to the next bend, onward to the next bridge; chasing the sun, pursuing the beckoning hand of unachieved achievement, leaping to new experiences and defying the light of Hope to sink beneath the horizon of Despair. Sounding a warning at the crossings, braving the gloom of the tunnels, bowling along, trolling a song, beating the rails of Life.
We are all trains—trains with beating brains; pulsing living motived men, oft’ pausing to pant with the signal against us; stopping to pick up new ideas and set down old; halting to fill up at the tank of
The Home Signal Against Him
A train is life in little, existence on distance, a fleeting thought, and a forward move.
Technical Education for Railwaymen
Europe has always paid much attention to the subject of the technical education of the railwayman, and the endeavours of the railways in this direction are exemplified by the recent opening of two new educational establishments by the Home railways—one on the London and North Eastern line and the other on the London Underground system.
At York the first-named railway has opened what probably ranks as the best equipped signalling school in Britain. In this school there will be given to the staff dealing with the constructional and maintenance of signal, telegraph and telephone installations, instruction in the principles of electrical and mechanical signalling and of telegraphy and telephony. In addition, instruction will also be given the operating employees in block working and traffic handling.—(From our London Correspondent).
Up-To-Date Gymnasium Opened At Wellington.
Promoting the Interests of a Noble Game.
The New Zealand School of Wrestling was officially opened at Wellington on Monday, 22nd June, by Mr. H. D. Bennett, president of the Dominion Wrestling Union.
This school promises to be something out of the ordinary, and is out to develop the best amateur talent possible under ideal gymnasium conditions.
“Smiler” Clark, late Australian heavyweight champion, is the instructor, while the manager is Mr. Pat Allen, well known in Wellington.
In opening the school before a large attendance of the public, Mr. Bennett said it was the finest of its kind he had seen, and he was sure that the men who were running it would do well. Such an elaborate gymnasium would encourage young people to take up the noble game of wrestling, which was the oldest and the best sport in the world.
Mr. Bennett said that he thought the public could look forward to the New Zealand School of Wrestling to turn out some of the best amateurs in the country and the Dominion Wrestling Union would give the school every assistance possible at all times.
Speaking of professional wrestling, Mr. Bennett, whose remarks were frequently loudly applauded, said that now and again the newspaper made mention of “rough-house wrestling.”
“Complaint is made,” went on the speaker, “that wrestling is not what it used to be. It is true that at times some of the bouts have been a bit rough, at any rate in the eyes of New Zealanders. There are many of us, of course, who realise that a good deal of this so-called ‘rough-house wrestling’ is mere showmanship and is practised by the participants for the purpose of adding a little interest to the proceedings. We should tolerate it in the spirit in which it is given.”
Continuing, Mr. Bennett said that the Union was formed for the sole purpose of keeping the game clean in New Zealand; the Wrestling Union was determined not to permit professionalism among its members. All the officers acted purely in an honorary capacity; nobody was paid, each and all working as hard as possible for the love of the game.
“There is no danger,” went on the chairman of the controlling body, “of the rough element being introduced into New Zealand.”
Mr. Bennett added that amateurs had first claim upon the Union's profits. The Union was prepared to receive applications from colleges and universities for financial assistance. Funds of course were limited, but the Union would assist so far as its resources would permit.
Following the official opening, a number of exhibition bouts were staged, during which Harry Demetral, the Greek wrestler, was introduced to the public.—“N.Z. Referee.”
In “Sunny Nelson.”
An average day's Inward and Outward through booking of parcels.
byE. Vivian Hall
“From War to Debts, From Debts, From Debts to War”—Is the World Heading that Way?— War is a Counsel of Despair.
With the passing of the Great War there came a remarkable change in public thought. Political proposals of a constitutional character (new voting systems, the referendum, bi-cameral amendments, etc.) ceased to interest the public as they had done. Even the House of Lords issue in Britain entered into a period of slumber. In the place of these came problems of social economics, of production and wages, pensions, debts, taxation and tariffs. The huge legacy of war debts no doubt was one of the causes of this change in the centre of gravity. But, over and above that, the immense new material wealth of the Twentieth Century world was bound to give a bias towards economics and away from high politics. The academic food of last century's politicians could not satisfy the new materialism.
This increasing ascendancy of economics over politics has compelled the politician to put on economic spectacles, to consult economists, even to be ruled by them. In the Press the pre-war political gossip—of Kaisers, Tsars, and Kings— from Berlin, St. Petersburg, Paris, etc., has little modern counterpart; and what there is of it is overshadowed by bread-and-butter issues. Political practices have broken free from supposedly immutable political principles, and have attuned themselves expediently to considerations of time and place. For instance, Labour is tariffite in thinly populated Australia, and anti-tariff in populous Britain. On the same issue Conservatism has split more than once. Though old adherents of the “pure science” of politics do not like it, that “science” becomes more and more the handmaid of economic opportunism.
In the days of the Czars, Britain and the British Empire easily became impressed with a Russian scare in the heart of Asia. There was always a fear that some Foreign Office in some other country was minded to grab some doubtful territory. Though the Soviet forces are still on the Oxus and on the Amur, what is now most dreaded is Soviet propaganda, and Soviet wheat, and perhaps butter. Everyone wants things cheaper, yet imposes an impossible condition— that the price-fall be confined to what he does not sell. Consequently, all are very discontented, especially as price-fall relentlessly increases debt. As might have been expected, uneconomic politicians do
And now, having drifted steadily from the old atmosphere of “high politics” to an atmosphere of distressful and resentful “econopolitics,” is there a danger of a flash back? It was a saying in the last century that a cure for domestic distress was a successful war; and some people believed that a vein of similar psychology in Napoleon III. threw him and France into the Prussian trap in 1870. To attempt to draw a people's attention from ills at home to glorious war abroad is at best a gamble. And since a warfare of trenches, covering years, has replaced the Sedans and Waterloos, war as a remedy for anything seems more than ever incredible. What can war create except bankruptcy? And yet in recent months the rumour of a new war has grown up in Europe, and is growing still.
The smouldering fires of much poverty and sweating and some idleness, which may be attributed in part to the incapacity of politicians to face the new dominating economic problems, are real enough, and might be kindled so as to provide the flash-back from an inequitable commercialism to an annihilating warfare. It is conceivable that somewhere in Europe or Asia public opinion could be so fanned to an outburst. But if the common sense of peoples is not proof against international incendiarism, are not the creditor forces of the modern world sufficiently self-interested to intervene and prevent the fanning of the flames of a conflict that means total destruction? They have seen their bonds barely survive the blaze of 1914–18. Is it to be hoped that the inverted pyramid of world debts could stand the shock of another conflagration?
Of much immediate consequence is Germany's demand for another review of the debts. As measured by the lower prices of goods the war debts are crushing on all debtors, and Germany declares that her share of the burden is unbearable. Behind the German political mission to England is the renewed demand for a more practical rearrangement of the economic burden, or for a moratorium; and in the United States (the ultimate creditor) Senator Borah's reported utterances go a long way towards encouraging the debtor countries to hope for something. There is a feeling that prevalent burdens, if not eased, will play into the hands of warmongers and other wreckers. Things must not be allowed to become so bad that any large section of people can be persuaded to prefer war. Thus politicalism and militarism again become interlocked with the economic tangle.
If it became economically necessary to reduce, by persuasion or by force, the burden of public debts in Europe and as between Europe and America, then Australia's debts would become relatively a small affair. But for the present they stand before the world as the subject of a great experiment. The Australian Premiers’ Conference has just decided to ask internal bondholders to voluntarily convert about 550 millions of debt, bearing interest normally at about 5 per cent, to about 4 per cent., thus saving the Australian Governments 6 1/2 millions a year in interest, and thus avoiding a probable default at an early date in payment by Governments of interest due. Voluntary conversion (unforced by taxation) would not only bring financial relief, but its moral effect would be enormous.
What, then, does the future hold? A rearrangement of economic burdens by voluntary agreement—voluntary acceptance of reduced interest by the bondholder, as of reduced pay by the worker, reduced rents, etc.? Or a state of deadlock between creditor and debtor individuals, and between creditor and debtor
Western civilisation crashes into economic ruin, Asia and Africa profiting by the destruction of Europe.
The onus is on civilisation to prove Ludendorff wrong. That can only be done by political leaders possessed of complete economic vision.
Since the above was written President Hoover has proposed a year's moratorium —an event of outstanding world-importance, and surely justifying what has been stated on this page, not only this month but in earlier months, concerning the perilous over-burden of the debts, crushing not only to the ultimate debtor (Germany) but to the ultimate creditor, America herself. Unless they had realised that Europe's suffering is America's suffering, the President could not have so acted, and Senator Borah would not have changed his course. The next move is with the nations that are both debtor and creditor. Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald has already promised co-operation in details, speaking for “His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom.” Though a year's moratorium is in no way synonymous with debt-cancellation, its economic success would immensely strengthen the case for general debt-reduction. All eyes are now on France, who can make or mar.
Opening Parliament In New Zealand.
(Rly. Publicity photo.)
The Governor-General, Lord Bledisloe, and Her Excellency Lady Bledisloe, with representatives of the Army and Navy at the opening of Parliament at Wellington.
Rail Travel in England and New Zealand
“I have often heard complaints of the New Zealand railways, but, taking into consideration the difference in cost between first-class accommodation in England and the Dominion, I would give them a flat contradiction,” said Mr. Arthur Rose, who returned to Christchurch recently from an extended trip abroad. “In England,” he explained, “you have to pay about 2 1/4 d. a mile for travel, against only about l 1/2d. in New Zealand. I am satisfied that if the New Zealand public was prepared to pay the same rate as in England, our railways would hold their own.”—(From the Christchurch “Press.”)
Even those who have given but little serious thought to the matter, must realise the part which the railway system has played in opening up the country— how it has been responsible for bringing the “never-never” parts of the Dominion into close association with the cities and ports, thereby adding immensely to the value of the areas thus tapped (says the “Timaru Post”). Immense areas would to-day be almost valueless had those who controlled affairs in the early days not shown enterprise in pushing railways into far back country. The unearned increment, as far as the holders are concerned, resulting from the expenditure of public money on such railways, is incalculable. When the greater part of the lines were constructed, transport fell far short of what it is to-day. Road traffic was carried on with the aid of bullocks and horses! Petrol-propelled vehicles could scarcely be regarded as even a dream. The issue at that time was: Railways and prosperity, or stagnation.
A Typical Workshops Scene On The N.Z.R.
(Rly. Publicity photo)
A section of the Machine Shop, Otahuhu Workshops, Auckland.
Sir Julius Vogel and his associates chose the former course; those who succeeded to power later improved upon the work of the founders of the Public Works policy, and as a result the country blossomed like a rose. Then came competition, due to improved roads and motor vehicles. But the railways had already done their pioneering work—they had in large measure eliminated distance. The good which they accomplished in the past is ineradicable; they made settlement possible, and to-day it is interesting to contemplate what would be the position had our early politicians shown lack of courage and vision in this connection. The Dominion would still be largely uninhabited, vast areas would still be in their primeval condition; our population would be relatively small; we would be unable to look back, as we can to-day, to our proud traditions on the plane of Empire affairs. But benefits like these cannot be expected without our making recompense.
Woman's Place In The Home.
When will the answer to this much disputed question be found? When will long paragraphs in the newspapers cease to appear—paragraphs boldly signed “A Mere Male,” or “I remain, dear sir, A Husband,” or “Father of Family”—in which the position of women is discussed from every possible and impossible point of view? Is the day at hand when she will be accepted once and for all for what she is, and not derided cruelly and tolerantly for what she aspires to be? Perhaps all this discussion is a healthy sign; a sign of new importance and an altogether new sphere of activity. At least, it is an indication that she has emerged finally from the dark obscurity in which she has had her being for many centuries—“the power behind the throne”—the gentle, unobtrusive, and unassuming head of the family, accepting no credit, claiming no recognition, content with her minute world of trivial decisions and daily responsibilities, her “raison d'ětre” simply that of providing a comfortable, serene environment for husband and sons, and an adequate domestic education for gentle, dutiful daughters. How often we read in history and in novels of this shadowy, charming creature with her smile of encouragement and her touch of healing and sympathy. Men have come to regard such a being as an ideal, and even now they cherish some vague aspiration towards a home founded on these traditions.
We have disillusioned them somewhat cruelly and rapidly. Our evolution has suddenly jumped forward with a bound, and we have left the masculine world gasping in astonishment—perplexed, incredulous, and even dismayed.
“The old order” has changed too swiftly; hastened by the outbreak of war with its demands on both sexes. Women were forced to step into men's positions, assume tremendous responsibilities, organise, command—emerge. Is it just to expect her to crawl contentedly back to her kennel now that she is no longer needed in the world of business and power? She has shewn her capabilities and surprised even herself. Given an opportunity she is equal to anything, and since the War she has been feverishly seeking that chance, sometimes at the expense of her home and family.
This is merely temporary, new adjustments are being made, and a new scale of values established. Man is a singularly adaptable animal, and will ultimately find his level in an altered
Your Skin in Winter
We read in novels that “the young girl rushes in from a brisk walk in the icy blast, her cheeks glowing, the very spirit of freshness and beauty.” And there is no reason why winter should detract at all from her charms if she prepares sensibly for the rough kisses of the southerly, just as she does for fierce Lord Sun in the summer. Yet many girls simply dread the winter as a time of sore lips, most unattractive red noses rather than flushed cheeks, and a skin which cracks and peels for three miserable months. It is impossible for a woman with perfect features to appear in any way to advantage if she allows a delicate, sensitive skin to be exposed to a ruthless climate. The damage may be permanent, whereas with a little care and thought she need fear nothing. Spend a little less time on your clothes and a little more on a scientific understanding of the skin, and you will be amply rewarded.
It is a woman's birthright to have a lovely, clear, radiant complexion, yet so many of us abuse our privilege and overestimate its durability. Fresh air is essential to beauty, whether it be winter or summer, but a few simple precautions must be taken.
In the first place, never dream of going out into the cold air immediately after washing your face in warm water. The pores of the skin are open, and its texture is immediately coarsened. This applies also to the use of cream and powder—always bathe the face with cold water, which is a tonic for the muscles as well. By the way, use as little soap as possible in winter, it dries up the natural oils of the skin; also, increase your application of cold cream when returning from outdoors and before retiring. Never go out without some protection—face cream carefully rubbed in and rather more powder than in summer. A protective “armour” against the wind is thus formed; but always remove it before applying more. A skin lotion for the very delicate skin is advisable.
Famous Express Locomotive.
The career of the famous G.W.R. express locomotive City of Truro has ended in a fitting way, for, instead of being scrapped, it has journeyed to York, there to take its place with honoured engines of the past in the Railway Museum (says the London Daily Express).
For trains, the City of Truro set up a speed record of 102.3 miles per hour as far back as May, 1904. This record has never been officially beaten by any steam engine to this day.
Not only were the engine's builders and owners honoured by this record, but valuable traffic was finally secured for the G.W.R. in face of two other competitors.
The Men Who Supervise Operations In The Department's Workshops.
(Photo, A. P. Godber.)
Mr. A. E. P. Walworth, Works Manager (centre second row from front) and his engineering staff at the Hutt Valley Workshops, Wellington. This group was taken on the eve of Mr. Walworth's transfer to the position of Works Manager, Otahubu; and includes Messrs. W. G. T. Pullin (General Foreman), W. Smith (Foreman Blacksmith), A. P. Godber (Asst. Machine Shop Foreman), and E. N. Campbell (Sub-Foreman) all of whom recently retired on superannuation.
This record run of 225 3/4 miles between Plymouth and London at an average speed, including stops, of 65.49 miles per hour, during the first section of which run to Bristol the City of Truro set up the world's record, established Plymouth as the port of transhipment for the direct New York-to-London mail route.
Another laurel falls to this engine also, for it was the first mechanically driven vehicle to exceed the 100 miles an hour mark.
This old veteran of railway history did not make its last run under its own power, but as part of a goods train. During its twenty-seven years of useful life this engine is estimated to have covered one million miles.
Siemen's Neophone
British Post Office places order for 200,000 Instruments.
To those engaged in the art of communication nothing is more striking than the revolutionary developments which are taking place in telephony, especially in the conversion of switching to a mechanical basis and in the remarkably rapid extension of long distance communication. These developments are due in the first place to the fact that prompt and accurate interchange of ideas by means of speech is a primitive and fundamental need in human intercourse. To whatever extent means for satisfying this need are made available, they will be accepted and used by the community, provided always that the cost is not exorbitant. It is the realisation of this fact that has justified the very large amounts expended in financing the developments now taking place. Yet finance alone is not sufficient to bring about these great advances. It is progress on the technical side that has made it possible for telephone administrations thus to extend their activities. Technical progress has been made in two ways: first, in the application of scientific methods of study to the performance of telephone plant and, second, in the development of new and improved materials and manufacturing processes.
One very important item of telephone plant, namely, the subscriber's instrument, has, however, not benefited by these developments. The reason is to be sought mainly in the policy adopted by some of the largest telephone administrations, which until recently found it inconvenient to admit a new type of instrument, just as, years ago, they found it inconvenient to admit the automatic system. As a result of the public demand, however, this reluctance has now been broken down. The telephone is no longer regarded by the subscriber as an electrical contrivance entitled to some respect and entailing a certain amount of inconvenience in its installation and use. Encouraged by the rapid and efficient service given by the automatic exchange, he looks upon the telephone nowadays as a necessary and welcome accessory and expects it to be as serviceable and as handy as his fountain pen! He is impatient of technical difficulties, and where technical difficulties interfere with his convenience, he insists that they must be overcome. Coincident with the growth of this feeling has been the expansion of telephone networks to a stage at which difficulties are being experienced in finding space under our streets for the enormous numbers of conductors now required. Means of overcoming the difficulty by the substitution of conductors of lighter gauge have been sought, but the extent to which this remedy is effective is limited by consideration of the transmission efficiency of existing instruments. Another feature of recent development has been the technical perfection attained on long-distance net-works, national and international. Attenuation and distortion are practically eliminated. A modern long-distance circuit, regardless of its length, transmits all frequencies between 300 cycles per sec. and 2,000 cycles per sec. with a practically uniform attenuation of about ten decibels. (The word “decibel” is now internationally adopted as the name for the “transmission unit.” Broadly speaking a decibel, a standard mile and a decineper are all equal.) Proposals are now being discussed to extend the frequency range for uniform transmission upwards to 2,400 cycles per sec. This achievement has been the result of the application of detailed scientific study to the problems of
Summarising the circumstances outlined above, we may say that the insistent desire of the subscriber for a more convenient type of instrument, the technical progress made in other branches of the telephone art, and the scientific knowledge and methods of study and manufacture which recent years have made available, have all combined to demand and to make possible the production of a new and greatly improved type of telephone instrument.
On account of the intimate association of the subscriber's instrument with the public, it is very desirable that the type adopted should be permanent for as long a period as possible. To secure this degree of permanency, it is not enough that the new type should meet the demands of the present state of the art. It should represent such an advance that it will fulfil future requirements so as to defer as long as possible the time when progress in other branches of the art necessitates another change.
It is with the confident belief that such an advance has been made that the “Neophone,” the new telephone, has been introduced.
The British Post Office, recognising that the time had arrived for the introduction of a new type, investigated and tested several types recently introduced, but without finding one complying fully with its requirements. It therefore associated itself actively with Siemens Brothers and Co. Ltd. during the later stages of the development of their instrument, so that, in those details which most nearly concern the administration and the subscribers, the company had the cooperation of the Post Office engineers. It has also assisted by conducting confirmatory life and other tests in its own laboratories.
Following upon these investigations, orders for over 200,000 Neophones for the British Post Office have been placed with the Company.
(To be concluded.)
(Written for the “New Zealand Railways Magazine” by
H. Collett
The insect world of New Zealand has provided forms, not only indigenous to our islands, but new to the entomologist.
The subject of this article will be a fascinating New Zealander; small, slender, elegant, with a body barely one-quarter of an inch in size. To the casual observer, a common and insignificant midge; “a something with four wings and six legs that flies!” Yet, under the revealing lenses of the microscope, an insect of strange beauty as to structure and coloration!
Let us go one step further, and bring to bear the lenses of observation and study—our labours will be amply repaid.
Firstly, let us consider its relatives; these are the ubiquitous sandfly—so well and painfully known to many of us—the mosquito — that bloodsucking soloist daddy longlegs—beloved of childhood's fairy fancy—and, last but not least, our “living torch bearer,” the glow worm (completing life as a glow-moth) of our caves.
Delving further, we find the larva, inhabiting the soft mud at the bottom of stagnant pools, arrayed in conspicuous crimson vestments.
The chrysalid stage is even more elaborate in colouration. The abdominal segments still retain a crimson splendour; the blunt and rounded thorax is a warm rich brown. On either side of the thorax are white and feathery plume-like gills with a bright yellow sac at the base; and, at the tail end are another smaller set of gills—the whole of wondrous beauty!
The reader may say, if personal observation is suggested, “How am I to study an insect that secludes in mud?”
A glass jar as an aquarium—filled with water, a little soil and weeds, from the larval pool, thrown in.
The captives will lose no time before constructing their tube-galleries about the glass walls, starting from the mud and going upwards as high as four inches. Occasionally some may be seen swimming about slowly in zig-zags. Owing to their peculiar buoyant construction it is a feat to remain submerged; once the surface is reached, descent is impossible.
The pupa never emerges from its tube till about to make the final transformation; till then, the gills absorb a sufficient supply of air to make this possible. The tube-cells are kept fresh by a continuous circulation of water, driven through them by strong pupal movements.
Twenty-four hours before the final transformation the case assumes a distinctly silvery appearance brought about by the conservation of air around the coming perfect insect and inflating the pupal skin to give it the buoyancy necessary to float to the surface when the time arrives for the final change. Then, the case bursts across the thorax; the imago crawls slowly forth, releasing each pair of legs together to rest upon the surface. The wings follow, and, finally, the body is freed. Within the next ten minutes the wings are firm enough for use and the new-born midge flies away strongly and swiftly.