In Jai] "Truth":—another piece of news that catch mine eye was from Tunbridge Wells, where the magistrates sat in conclave outside the cell of an accused prisoner who ed not be brought into public court by reason of his having the german measles. A distemper that be now rageing all over the country, and, though seldom dangerous, is notoriously infectious. Soe doubtless these magistrate did the prudent thing in holding their sitting where they did for the public protectioun's sake, yet must methinks have been setting a novel precedent therein. At least I never heard tell of the like before. Seems in a manner strange that this particular distemper slid have assailed us just now, when we are at warr with the Germans; more specially as a-many of the ignorant public do falsely sup-pease it for a distemper of German origin on the strength of its name. Nay, I have met some, who by their education slid have known better, to persist in spelling it with a capital for that reason. Whereas, in fact, "german' here is one lie another spelling of "germane" and do but intimate the kinshipp/of german measles to ordinaire measles.
Writer disinterested thinker and writer J. A. Hobson, Britain has known no more
than J. A. Hobson, observes the "New Statesman and Nation." Partly because he did not wear an old school tie and partly because his first economic work departed from the ruts of current orthodoxy, Mr. Hobson never received academic recognition. If you wish to be an unorthodox economist in this country, it is well to keep your herešies until you are already established in a professional chair, But Mr. Hobson's influence was immense and his famous under-consumption theory became in 1931 almost a commonplace. He remained an independent thinker, a Liberal reformer at heart, but one whose analysis of Imperialism was accepted by Lenin and whose proposals often formed the theoretical basis for Socialist thinking in this country. One of the early members of the Union of Democratic Control he fought its battle throughout the last war and remained its chairman up to the last year of his life. That ironical turn of phrase that was so effective in his writing was even more devastating and delightful in his conversation. An apparently frail man, though once an athlete, he lived to see in his old age his theories largely accepted and his worst fears of the consequences of their neglect realized in this country. He was one of the old guards who really minded about intellectual integrity, and were prepared to run risks for freedom and for peace. He seemed without personal ambition, unless it was the ambition to think more clearly and live more unselfishly than other people,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.