The times., 1899-08-06

LEGISLATION - important Measures
Put Aside - The 0Id-Age Pension.
London, Aug. 5.-Parliament will be up
in a few days and the Ministers will have
that free hand in foreign affairs.for which
some of them and their more impetuous
followers have been yearning. The pros
pect arouses anxiety in many quarters,
Ministerialist as well as Radical, but time
will probably prove this anxiety to be
quite uncalled for. Not that affairs in the
! Transvaal are not still critical, but the in
fuences making for peace are more pow
| erful than those making for that most
terrible of conflicts, a racial outbreak be-
tween Dutch and British in all South Af-
rica.
The latest, and to the British mind, per-
! haps also to the Boer mind, the most po-
1 tent of these influences making for peace,
is the solidarity of opinion throughout the
Empire With especial gratitude have the
British Ministers received this week the
4 enthusiastic endorsement of their policy
of firm and patient pressure, which has
come from the Canadian Parliament, led
+ by a Premier who, as a French Canadian,
/ is held to speak with peculiar authority
/ of the effect of equal political rights in
assuaging racial difficulties.
Below the Surface.
| Looking below the surface, it is realized
both here and in Pretoria that though an
equitable franchise to the Outlanders is the
question of the moment, the real struggle
| concerns the maintenance of the British
| suzerainty over the Transvaal Republic.
Mr. Chamberlain at this iuncture proposes
a joint enquiry into the effect and the ex-
! act meaning of the new Volksraad fran
chise law. This TO President Kruger
means an assertion of suzerain rights, and
| he meets ii by proposal to nominate
French and German as well as British and
Beers to hold an enquiry, thus depriying
| England of any special right OF interven
! tion.
Again, in the matter of the dynamite
monopoly the original concessionaiTes
were French and German capitalists, and
the fact that their net annual profit is
! SO ,000 coo, has suggested that the present
mission to st. Petersburg of M. De.casse
may have for one object joint European
demonstration against ERglands attempt
to cancel this monopoly, and reassert Brit
ish paramountcy in South Africa. OF
course, the ridiculous collapse of the
| Kaiser's attempted intervention at the
III Paris and St Petersburg, but England
might not be SO ready to launch her flying
/ squadrons when three such powers as
France, Germany, and Russia are con-
cerned.
NJ. DeIcasse's Mission.
| But even apart from South Africa, M
| Delcasse's mission is a European event Of
the first magnitude. 1t is a natural sequel
to the little coquetry that has been going
on of late between Madame La Republique
and the gallant Kaiser. France is not, we
may be sure, thought any less of at st.
| Petersburg because of the little Irritation
on the Iphigenie, and it all makes for Eu-
| Topean peace and internal tranquility in
France that at this anxious moment in the
development of the Dreyfus drama the Pa
risian boulevardiers should have unmis-
taxable evidence of the stability of the
Franco-Russian alliance.
/ 1t would be further and most momen-
tous guarantee of European peace were the
cartoonist of the Austrian ''Humoristische
Blatter" TO prove true prophet. He de-
picts friendly greetings On board the Iphi-
genie between the German Kaiser and the
French President, while overheard is
struggling the figure Of La Revanche. Dis
| appointment is given as the cause of her
suicide.
With the August bank holiday London
| enters upon the political dead season.
Even candid Ministerialists admit that the
/ parliamentary session now drawing to a
close has been singularly devoid of such
useful legislation as Ministry with a
majority of 40 at its back and House of
Lords at its beck and call should have ac-
| complished.
Mr.. BaIfour's Declaration.
It is true that Mr.. A. ]. Balfour, the
/ faadar in he IJO,,eo Of Gov,
mons, last week declared that "the present
session has been without dramatic incident,
and no session has ever drawn to a close
under more favorable auspices in regard
I TO the useful legislative work it has ac-
complished." But he must have said it
with his tongue in his cheek. for the only
claim that the session has to public re-
| membrance is the long list of useful and
much-needed measures to remedy the
| abuses in the company laws, the extor-
| tionate practices of the money lenders, the
! dangerous coupling arrangements of the
| railway companies, and the fatal laxity OF
the law in regard to the use of low flash
| lamp oil-Ineasures brought forward only
to be dropped under the pressure OF private
interests affected by them.
The MiEisterialists themselves feel the
| legislative poverty of the session, and to
this feeling is in a measure due the curl
Gus haste with which MIR. Joseph Chamber
lain, with his eye ever upon the electorate
has hurried forward the stupendous report
OF the parliamentary committee on old
age pensions. No one supposes that the
Chancellor of the Exchequer intends to
sour the taxpayer, just before the general
election, by providing the $50, 600 000 which
il must cost to meet a pension for every
citizen over sixty-fve whose income is
under $3.50 a week; but, on the other
hand. such an old age pension scheme is 9
useful bait at election time, and Mr. Cham
berlain is nothing if not an astute election
agent.
| Popular Pensions.
OF course, this suggested dole to the
workingman has given the protectionist his
chance Yesterday the Daily Telegraph
opened the silly season by a wild proposal
that the exchequer should be helped in
this matter Of pensions by a 5-shilling duty
on imported wheat. Then" say the pro-
tectiOnists, we might get money TO make
a pension Of $3.50 a week, and start it al
the age Of forty-five years instead of sixty
five" But not even the persuasive elo-
quence of the Daily Telegraph" will bring
the workingman to see the wisdom Of buy
ing petty pension in old age by paying
for dear bread all his life.
Berlin journalists are busy pursuing tn,
| reported invention of artificial coal by one
Herr Montag, of Mannheim To England
especially, with its repeated scares of di-