Faom Our Own Caleutts, Dee. 5.
In this vast land of India with its millions of teeming toilers one has so many reminders of the distant past that it is dificult to believe that Western ideas have made the slightest. impression on the masses or will do s0 for at least another two centuries. To give examples. Probably that. Which "strikes the newcomer to Calcutta most is the number of tholy bulls and cows which wander at free will throughout the city, even entering the most fashionable! shoppitig centres. They truly have the freedom of the city for no ans owns them and every. devout Hindu feeds them when he has time! to think of it. It must be admitted, however, that the welfare of the [poor beasts is loft a little too much chance and when they fall sick with disease there is rarely anyone to look after them s9 they continue! suffering until merciful death relieves them of the burden of life. Then.there is the water carrier who, asin days of yore, still carries his skin of water' slung over his shoulders as most of us have seen him depicted when we were youngsters in the big pictorial family Bible.
Nevertheless, western ideas are! slowly but surely permeating the inarticulate masses of India, Gradually the people are learning the value of organization. The! beginning of the organization of the workers for economic purposes has already begun as the big cotton mill strike in Bombay has demonstrated. It is, however, to be noted—and this will no doubt be welcomed by many—that the workers are still chary of entering the field of polities. Only the other day at a meeting which was to have been addressed by a British M. P., Mr. T. Johnstone—he failed to turn up owing to indisposition—one of the workers in the audience! rose to his feet and, addressing the and that they, the work-not want to have anything to do with politics or political Teaders who, he said, only sought to benefit themselves. Who shall Jdoubt that this simple Indian worker was a very shrewd at Home has been the suspension of the cotton Excise duty whet has been sanctioned by the Viceroy. This "has come about as the result of a long agitation on the part of the mill-owners who alleged that the present. serious state which the Indian "cotton industry finds itself would not be relieved the cotton duty was lifted. The decision appears to have caused consternation in cotton circles at Home where it, is regarded as a serious blow at the Laneash cotton industry which works on a [very fine margin. One member. Parliament declared that it meant important measure of protect to an increasing manufacturing industry of India and a consider: able loss of trade to Lancashire, Political Propaganda Some of the political propaganda against the Government spread extremist newspapers in India is of a kind hardly creditable to it progenitors. The latest "story is that of a young Bengali student who, it is alleged, had a narrow escape from becoming a police spy. Long letters have been published in 8 Calcutta paper called "Forward" [from the student in question, purporting to show how Visited. police "officer and how the latter Jaid his net for hint order to make him an agent provocateur. The bohea officer, it is alleged, offered to play unlimited—money' at his disposal and the unstinted support of. the British Goverment spying. A full inquiry will doubt be made into these charges but, meanwhile, ft is worthy note that the evidence adduced by [the newspaper is extremely slender, for we are asked to believe that responsible police officer would ask a complete stranger, after one visit to cet as an agent provocateur, promising him material and moral support of the British Government, 'There is not the shadow of evidence, far, to prove that the police officer in question made any" such offer to the student, nor does it seem likely that. any' evidence wil be produced to support the suggestion that the police employ genre Provocatenrs, The Bose Institute During the past wack the eighth anniversary of the Bose Institute was celebrated and the occasion will be a memorable one to all those who witnessed it, for its founder, Sir Jagadis Bore, delivered an. intensely interesting exposition of hhis most recent discoveries in connexion with plant life—diseoveries, indeed, which will revolutionize the scientific view of the subject. means of the most delicate ments, which do him great credit inventor, Sir Jagadis proved that the structural system of the plant is by no means #0 different from that of the animal as seientists have imagined, that plants: have a pulsating centre corresponding to the heart in animals which can be vitally affected in the same way; also that they have a muscular system. One of the local papers has referred to Sir J. C. Bose as the Darwin of botany, a compliment which is no doubt fully deserved for it does seem as though we sha! soon be talking quite as glibly about our cousin the cabbage as our distant relative the ape, Suspension of Cotton Excise An event of the past week which has caused some sensation in commercial circles both here and World's Largest Air Base Before long, I learn on reliable information; India will be able to boast of having the largest air base in the world. This will be tha Imperial Airships' base at Karachi which will cover approximately: 1,000 acres. The shed will be 850 fect long, 170 fect high and 180 feet high, and in addition a mooring-mast 200 fect high is to be erected. This will be provided witl, passenger lift and plant for mooring operations. "The control machinery will be operated. from the observation platform on the tao mast, The mains for fud, water and hydrogen will run up the mast and enable an airship to be replenished. Hydrogen will be made at the outset by the silieol process; later on, a permanent typo of plant will "be installed. Only temporary accommodation will. be supplied for the personnel, numbering about 100° Europeans and large number of Indians. The station which will be equipped wit', radio and meteorological sections, is expected to be completed by the year 1927. An idea of the size the main shed can be gathered Ly the statement that it will be capable of housing the Nelsoa Monument and Olympia or Pancras Railway Station or a foot ball match with 30,000 spectators.
Edinburgh Academicals by 12 to the Wanderers accounted for! Institution, 6 to 3; and Edinburgh University' went down before Dublin University—3 to 8.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.