THE BIGHT OF HELIGOLAND The fortifications, military establishments and harbours of the island of Heligoland and Dune are to be destroyed under the supervision of the Allies by German labour and at Germany's expense. They are not to be reconstructed, nor are any similar Peace Treaty. works to be constructed in future. From the Draft Literary Vogue of the Classics According to a Press representative who has been making inquiries among publishers, the creation of English classes in the Army has already had an extraordinary effect on the book market. Hundreds of men who would otherwise not have been interested in the more serious type of literature have discovered the value and necessity of reading books issued in the popular Libraries and reprints, and naturally the Army classes demand them. "Demobilisation," said one well known publisher, "has also created a remarkable increase in the readers of famous books. The students released are already buying up practically all the available copies of the cheaper editions of the classics." Another publisher remarked: "I do believe that the people are reading more thoughtful books than ever. I can remember in my time. The paper scarcity greatly hindered us, but I could never understand why we were limited to 25 per cent. of the pre-war quantity, while all kinds of ribald journals could be published at almost their full. The Government came to us and said they wanted 30,000 sets of our Shakespeare in three volumes for the men at the front. Could they be supplied? We said we could not supply them if we were not allowed the paper or the labour, and the Government themselves had to undertake the task of printing from our own plates. I know, too, that the Government gave a considerable grant to a society to purchase books for educational purposes at the front, and again they could not be supplied for want of paper. Surely if the Government were looking after vital things at this time, and it was necessary to stop any printing at all, it should not be that of the great classics of the world." 46 Literary Spendthrifts The elder Dumas probably made more money by his pen than any writer who ever lived, and he spent the money he earned with equal freedom. It is even said that he kept a dish of gold, as others at that period might have kept a bowl of punch, for his friends to dip into and help themselves. He placed no value upon money, and would give a handful of loose coins away to a beggar. Certainly his friends never appealed to him in vain. He was generous to a fault. Just such another by nature was Goldsmith. Whilst he was studying medicine at Leyden he lost all the money his uncle had provided at the gambling-table, and a fellow student and countryman, Ellis, thinking he would be utterly ruined if he stayed in the town, offered him his fare back to Ireland. This Goldsmith accepted, but was immediately struck with the idea that he ought to show gratitude to his uncle for much kindness, and so, the tulip mania being at its height, he expended the whole of Ellis's money in bulbs. Again reduced to poverty, he started on foot for a tour through Europe with one clean shirt, a ffute, and a guinea as provision for his journey! His unofficial epitaph was that he was the best loved and most "trusted 19 man in London, for he died in debt to all his friends and mourned by all the beggars of the town.-Selected. 362 Educational The Rowlatt Acts and School Boys Mr. C. F. Andrews writes to the Indian Social Reformer : Many years ago I resisted to the utmost of my power the action of the Government of India in promulgating the Risley Circular. The wheel has indeed come round full circle! On all sides we have evidence of a complete change of front on the part of Government. The authorities no longer desire that no current politics shall be taught in Schools and Colleges, but that only their own type of politics shall be taught. There have been ominous signs in Burma-that most docile of all the Provincesof this political volte face, but the latest and most flagrant example comes from the Punjab. I have in my possession a circular containing two resolutions passed unanimously at a meeting of the Principals of Colleges and Headmasters of High Schools in Lahore on April 21st, 1919. A former Vice-Chancellor of the University the Rev. Dr. Ewing, C. I. E,. presided. The following resolutions were passed: 1. (a) Resolved, that copies of Act No. XI of 1919 (commonly called the Rowlatt Act) together with copies of the Abstract, prepared by the Honourable Mr. Fagan, be distributed in all the Schools and Colleges in Lahore. (b) That all College Students be directed to read these, and invited to ask questions about anything in the Act they cannot understand, and informed that they are all liable to be called upon for viva voce examination on the main features of the Act. (c) That each Principal and Headmaster arrange for his Staff to meet one of the lawyers, who have volunteerd their assistance, and go through the Act with them, in order that they may be able to explain simple difficulties. (d) That each Headmaster undertake to make his own arrangements that students of the High Classes are informed of the main features of the Act and are examined thereon. 2. Resolved, that this body of Principals and Headmasters meet again a fortnight hence to report progress. In order to show the essential unfairness of such pressure being brought upon our Universities and Schools, let us take the political issue involved in the Rowlatt Act itself. As has been pointed out a hundred times by the opposition, the objection does not lie so much in the theory of the Act (it was agreed that in an extreme emergency the theory might be accepted) but in the practice. It was urged with a unanimous voice throughout the country that the danger of even the suggestion of putting new powers into the hands of the executive and the police was too great to risk. That is to say, the opposition was not to the Act in vacuo, but to the Act here and now in India.-in India, as we all know it, with its executive high-handedness playing into the hands of an unscrupulous and corrupt police, To show that this practical objection carries with it the weight of the highest authority, let me quote one passage from the Indian Police Commission's Report, 1902-3 : "The Commission have received endless narratives of the worries involved in a police investigation. A body of police comes down to the village and is questioned on it for several days. The principal residents have to dance attendance on the police all day long and for days and days together. Sometimes all the villagers are compelled to be in attendance and inquiries regarding their character are conducted coran copul. Suspects and innocent persons are bullied and threatened into giving evidence they are supposed to possess. The police officer owing to want of detective ability or to indolence, directs his efforts to procure confessions by improper inducements, by threats and moral pressure. Actual physical torture is now rarely resorted to: but it is easy, under the conditions of Indian Society and having regard to the character of the people, to excuse strong pressure and great cruelty without having recourse to such physical violence as leaves its traces on the body of its victims." I have only space for this brief quotation, but page after page of similar evidence might be given from the same report and other authoritative sources. It must also be remembered that the C. I. D., with its own peculiar avenues of bribery and corruption, has been separated off since 1902-1903, into a new police department. In many ways, owing specially to the vagueness of charges brought forward under the head of 'sedition', the corruption is worse today than it was when the Commission's Report was written. This police oppression is the daily lot of the common people of India. It enters into every village and hamlet. The evil is universal. Herein lies the principal reason for the immediate instinct of resistance to the And who that really Rowlatt Bill among the masses. knows the country would dare to say that this instinct was mistaken? But-this is my main point,-throughout all this College and School propaganda in Lahore which is now being encouraged by Government, there will be little or no mention of this vital objection to the Act. The different clauses will be explained by the lawyers; the theory of the Bill will be carefully expounded; the Government view of the case will be advocated; laborious tutoring will be given to show that there is nothing in the details of the Act for loyal and law-abiding citizens to be afraid of. All such things will be done, but the rest will be left untold. The students will probably hear nothing of the practical dangers of adding one more arbitrary power to the Executive, the police and the C. I. D., that is to say, they will be given a wholly one-sided impression. What is even worse, teachers will be forced to teach, and students will be forced to learn, things which they do not really believe. In consequence of this, sycophancy and hypocrisy will spring up, like weeds in some foul, unwholesome soil Lip-loyalty will grow rank and fatten itself on deception, while heart-loyalty will wither away and die for lack of moisture. Viva voce examinations, carried out under Government pressure, will make the students suspect the very things that the Government is only too obviously anxious that they should believe. The means taken will defeat the end in view. Legal Sir B. Scott. Sir Basil Scott Chief Justice, Bombay High Court, after a tenure of eleven years of office, during which period he fully maintained the best traditions and dignity of the High Office, retired on April 11. Members of all branches of legal profession united in paying a fitting tribute to the retiring Chief Justice, who replying to the compliments said :-" I was chosen years ago to be one of the lamp-bearers of justice to keep the lamp is this presidency burning bright and clear and to hand it undimmed to my successor. If I may accept what has been said of me during the last few days in friendly gatherings of lawyers the flame is still burning and undimmed. That this is so is due chiefly to the members of the legal profession who might, to keep up the metaphor, be termed the masals of the lamp, of justice. On the original and appellate sides of the Court this city is fortunate in having bodies of advocates, solicitors and pleaders who appreciate their duties and responsibilities and who render to the Bench in the trial of cases whole-hearted, support that is expected of them. It is seldom that time is wasted by too persistent or irrelevant arguments and seldom that points helpful to the right decision of the case are not brought before the court." He then thanked them for the support they had given to the Bench and bade them good-bye. Spying and the C. I. D. Writing to the Calcutta Statesman Mr. C. F Andrews substantiates his attack on the C. I. D. (published in our last number under the Legal Section) The letter is dated Delhi, 20th April:The time when I caught red-handed a Government spy searching my private papers was during the Deputy Commissionership of Mr. Humphreys in the year 1907. Mr. Humphreys was at Cambridge with me and a personal friend. I caught the man (who had come through a back door) with his hand actu ally in my study-table drawer, and he confessed that he had been sent by the Police. I was naturally indig 363 nant and sent at once to the Deputy Commissioner demanding an instant apology. A mounted policeman came back post-haste with the following words in a letter:-"My dear Andrews, it's nothing to do with me. It's those d-d C.I.D. people !" The epithet he used made any further apology from unnecessary. himself The two authenticated cases of Government spies being planted in the college, where I was teaching, were as follows:-The former was a student named Gokal Chand, whose testimony appeared in the Delhi Club Bomb case. In the evidence it was made clear that he had been tempted by the C.I.D. to bring them specimens of his comrades' handwriting and to act as a spy in other ways. What made the case more vile was this, that the boy was quite young. The evidence he gave on these points at the trial was not challenged or disputed. The second case was that of an exceptionally bright Muhammadan lad, whom I fully trusted as a friend. As he has, since that time, confessed fully his past misconduct, I do not think it right to give his name to the general public; but I am perfectly ready to give it to any one who might wish, for good reasons, to pursue this inquiry. Mr. Wallace on the Rowlatt Bills. Mr. Edgar Wallace, writing in the "Manchester Guardian," protests against the Rowlatt Bills and all that they imply. He declares that they are being introduced ostensibly for the supression of sedition in India, but in reality to shackle still further native public opinion in India.' Continuing, he says: "Heaven knows, India is sufficiently restless without these further provocative measures which have been introduced at the instance of a bureaucracy which differs in no respect whatever from the bureaucracy which we called the Kaiser's Government, save that in Germany there was at least a pretence that the Government was amenable to the processes of public opinion. National discontent, and particularly a discontent as widespread as that which exists in India, is not to be dragooned out of existence, and it seems to me that the time has arrived when the British public should take a more intelligent interest in their greatest possession, and should themselves examine the cause of the trouble, for which they eventually will have to pay. The Rowlatt Laws are instituted on the limsiest of excuses. bureaucracy will argue, of course, that these resThe trictive measures are only directed against assassins, but in reality they are directed against the Home Rule movement which, whatever may be its merits and whether we agree or do not agree with its objects, is a constitutional objective and one entitled to free development." 1 Medical Cure for Asthma Vaccination for bronchial asthma has been suggested by a study of a considerable number of cases. A specific protein appears to be present in the bronchial secretions of patients which can be recovered in a form to bring about immunity. A vaccine has been produced. It is prepared by incubating one volume of washed sputum for 48 hours in ten volumes of broth, with a few drops of guinea-pig serum. The culture is then standardised and killed by a heat of 60° C. for two hours, and phenol is added. to prevent further decomposition. The effect of doses of five to fifteen minims has been observed in twenty cases of typical bronchial asthma. In twelve of the cases writes the Popular Science Siftings, there was complete relief from the attacks after one to five injections of vaccine, and this relief continued during the time of observation-six weeks to sixteen months. In two complicated cases there was no improvement, and in one case the treatment seemed harmful, the paroxysms increasing in intensity. Sir R. Ross on Malaria In the course of a recent lecture delivered at the King's College Hospital, London, Sir Ronald Ross dealt with the discovery that malaria was a living contagion in the blood, and traced the connexion between mosquitos and the spread of malaria. In 1895 Manson's hypothesis was that malaria was carried by the mosquito, and Sir Ronald Ross, who was then in the Indian Medical Service, determined to investigate the supposition. He collected mosquitos and made them bite patients, but at first the experiment failed absolutely. After two or three years he found that he had been using the wrong species of mosquitos, but after working with the real species he discovered the parasite of malaria growing in the tissues of the mosquito. Later on his experiment was confirmed by other inquiries, and it had now been demonstrated that malaria was connected with marshes. All mosquitos did not grow in marshes, for they had been found in drains, streams, and many places-indeed, they would breed almost anywhere. It was not the germ, however, that bred in the marsh: but the carrier of the germ. The next thing was to study mosquitos, their breeding habits, the growth of the parasites in mosquitos, and so on; that had been going on since 1897 up to this day, and much information had been gained. The prevention of malaria spread by the mosquito had been a great mystery. Medical men did not seem to take much interest in such questions as prevention; and it might be asked how were they going to apply their present knowledge to the saving of life on a large scale. He suggested that the best way was to drain marshy localities; and in 1899 he submitted a memorandum to the Government of India advocating the drainage of malaria pools in that country. Kech had suggested that quinine was the best remedy; and another method was protection by means of mosquito gauze; but they now began to see that to prevent the breeding of. the mosquito was the main remedy. They now knew where mosquitos bred, and in order to prevent the disease it was necessary to drain effectively. Thousands of cases were treated with quinine at Salonika, but still the death rate was high. What it would have been, however, without quinine it was impossible to say. It had been estimated that the death rate among children in India, who were not given quinine, was 1,800,000 per annum. Remedies for Caustic Soda Burns In a paper read before the National Safety Convention at New York, a two per cent. solution of acetic acid as an acid wash, followed by an oil dressing, was recommended for painful burns in caustic soda works. Cotton wool should not be placed in immediate contact with the wound, but can be used on top of a lint-free pad saturat. ed with vaseline, crron oil or other air excluder. |