Rhondda Leader Maesteg Garw and Ogmore Telegraph

Wrest I in Tournament at Maesteg. Under the auspices of the Maesteg Health and Strength League Olub, a very interesting wrestling tournament was held at the Town Hall on the 20th, 21st and 22nd September. There was a very large array of competitors from all parts of the Kingdom. The prizes consisted of: Middleweight 1st prize, Onyx time- keeper and vases, value 10 guineas; 2nd prize, silver medal. Lightweight, feather- weight and bantam weight: 1st prizes, silver cups; 2nd prizes, silver medals. Mr. D. J. Griffiths, M.E., Maesteg, acted as referee, with Mr. S. J. Howells as timekeeper, while Mr. D. J. Davies, of Carmarthen, performed the duties of M.C. During, the intervals between the bouts, a very interesting sketch was staged by the famous Rees Brothers, entitled Pastime, in Camp," which included the manipulation of cannon balls, shells, &c. Mr. C. B: Thomas, of Oaerau, and Mr. Tom Morgans, Abergwynfi, also gave ex- hibitions of physical culture. The follow- ing were the winners in the competitions Middleweight: 1st, Jack Richards, Maesteg; 2nd, R. Watkins, C'aerau. Lightweight: 1st, Jack Richards, Maes- teg; 2nd, Levi Williams, Pbntycymmer. Featherweight: 1st, Arthur Morris, Perth; 2nd, Dick Richards, Maesteg. Bantam weight: let, George Rickards, Maesteg; 2nd, Jack Davies, Caerau. The meetings concluded each evening with exhibition wrestling bouts by the Reesl Brothers.

Don't tink do world's consarn d 'bout you You ve got ter holler sonny Oe man dat runs de biggest shout, Gits closesi to de money IN THE Are you in doubt as to what is the trouble with YOUR EYES P Call, and on the subject let us 1 III HII 0UR NIETHODS of SIGHT TESTING are based on Scientific Principles. LLLI^ TFFIJ),. ^11 Your Eyes Exa ined Free of Charge, Address— EMRYS RICHARDS Fyr' llSm Chemist and Optician, TO NY PAN DY jjj (One minute from New Tonypandy bcation). 3111

Popular Budget. Enthusiastic Meeting at Williamstown. Mr. Brace, M.P., Ready to Fight. A Budget League meeting was held at Williamistown on Friday evening, and was attended by nearly five hundred people. Mr. John Thomas presided, the chief I speakers being Mr. Wm. Brace, M.P., Mr. Edgar Jones, lecturer to the Welsh National Liberal Council, and Mr. Vaughan Edwards, Swansea. A similar meeting was held at Tonyrefail on the same evening, and was addressed by the I same speakers. Mr. Vaughan Edwards described the Budget as the Budget of the century, and said that its two cardinal features were j that, in the first place, it did not tax the necessaries of life, and secondly, it imposed taxes on those most able to bear it. The Budget did not touch the table. The new taxation fell mainly on luxuries, and this was a new feature in the Budgets of history. Mr. Lloyd George proposed to take from the superabundance of the rich to relieve the penury of t3 poor. Mr. Lloyd George was a son of the people, and he knew only too well that he could not tax the table. That was already over- taxed. The working man had borne his burden patiently, and the Chancellor now came to relieve him of that burden (cheens). The money was wanted for national defence, for the extension of old- age pensions—(applause)—to establish insurance against sickness and unemploy- ment, to establish Labour Exchanges, and improve agricultural land. These pro- posals were what Lord Ro.seh^y—who once prided himself upon thinking Im- perially, but who was now acting parochially—described as Socialism. All he (the speaker) could say was that, if these proposals were Socialism, God speed Socialism (applause). Mr. Walter Long came to Mountain Ash, but offered no real criticism on the proposals of the Government. The meeting was attended by a large number of Tory workmen, whose fares had been paid, and who were given 2s. in pocket money. The day had gone, declared the speaker in impassioned tones, for the workmen of the country to receive bribes, and sell their birthrights for a mess of pottage (applause). The Conservatives dangled Old Age Pensions before the electorate, but their promises never materialised. Mr. Lloyd George, without promise, gave them to the old people of the country, in spite of the dukes and their satellites. The land- lords and dukes prided themselves upon being sportsmen, but it was poor sport to pension the old hunters in the field of sport, and begrudge pensions to old warriors in the field of industry (ap- plause). Proceeding, the speaker said that the most important portion of the Budget was the taxation of land values, and this, he said, was only giving back to the people what really belonged to -them. In Swansea a new dock was required, and 20 acres of land was necessary for the project. They obtained the land from the Earl of Jersey. The land was only assessed for rating purposes at jE3 10s. per acre, but his lordship received for this same land £ 200,000' (" Shame "). If the Budget had been passed three years ago, £ 40,000 of this would have gone to the Exchequer, and half of it would have gone to relieve the- rates of Swansea (applause). Mr. Lloyd George, continued Mr. Edwards, was charged with squandering 16 millions for social reform, but the people who made the charge squandered 250 millions in spilling Britain's best blood for the landlords of Belgravia. The usual Budget League resolution was proposed by Mr. H. J. Powell, and seconded by Mr. Griff. James (in Welsh), and Rev. T. Buckingham (in English). The resolution was carried without a single dissentient. During a wait in the proceedings for Messrs. Brace and Jones, Mr. John Bees (secretary of the Mid-Rhonddit, Trades and Labour Council) addressed the meeting. Mr. Brace, who arrived whilst the last speaker was speakin was accorded a hearty ovation. He said that as he came into that meeting he was taken somewhat by surprise, because the democracy of the country was supposed to be very angry with the Government, in particular, and with the members of Parliament, in general, because the Chancellor of the Exchequer had introduced a Budget which was intended to more equally dis- tribute the burdens of nationality than in the past (laughter). They had had speeches from the Prime Minister, the Earl of Bosebery, Mr. Balfour, and the lecturers and speakers of the Tariff Reform and Ante-Budget Leagues, and they had to face the issue. Sooner or later, the people of the country would be appealed to as the determining and dominating factors as to whether this financial scheme was to be accepted by Britain or not. The Earl of Rosebery's speech was an extraordinary one. He attacked the Budget, and almost cursed it, but like many other people he was afraid to accept the consequences of his own opinion (laughter). When the ques- tion was pressing upon his land as to what he thought the Lords ought to do when the Finance Bill came before them, he was glad that they should have a fort- night to consider it (laughter). No man could claim the right to be a, leader of men unless at a time of crisis like the present he was prepared to stand by his convictions regardless of consequences (applause). The previous evening, the House of Lords, with a great deal of audacity, had mauled the Housing Bill- a Bill designed to make the cities and towns of the country more livable than they were at present. Land had become a kind of fetish to some people. It had become almost sacrad. Any power to take the land on behalf of the people- must be resisted, and Lord Cawdor, with remark- able truculence stood out for the rights and privileges of the peers. "We," said Mr. Brace, have no objection to the privileges of the land-owning classes, of the country, but they must carry a re- sponsibility proportionate to their privi- leges (applause). In the past, they have avoided their responsibilities. They have controlled the machinery of State, and twisted legislation in every form so that the burdens of taxation should fall upon the poor. Lloyd George is trying to cor- rect some of these wrongs, and is putting right what ought to have been put right many years ago (applause). It would be put right when the people made up their minds to say where they stood. The time had come when the masses should drive that kind of servility out of their blood. They should stand upon their feet as an* educated democracy and demand that the laws of the country should be so arranged that, in future, wealth would carry its responsibilities as well as receiving its privileges. That was all the Budget aimed at (applause). Dealing with mining royalties, the speaker said that of all taxes the most unfair was the royalty tax. The land- lords talked about land as if they made it and could carry it about in their waist- coat pockets (laughter). These were the days of the ainships, and it was no more unreasonable for landowners to tax the machines flying over their land than to tax the mineral beneath the earth (ap- plause). What was wrong with the pro- posal that out of these taxes the land- lords should contribute a small portion to the Exchequer. Last year, the land- lords of Barry alone took L22,000 in royalties upon the coal shipped at that port. If this Budget were passed, it would correct these great and grievous wrongs. Dealing with reversions, the speaker characterised the leasehold system as legal brigandage. It was absolute rob- bery, the taking away by the landlord that which he had no right to. The Rhondda Valley had been made a great thriving centre of industry, winning wealth for the miners and the colliery owners; but those who were the greatest gainers were the landowners. What the Budget proposed was that a fair portion of the enhanced value of the land made by public effort should go into the Exchequer to pay for national social reforms. The only thing wrong about the Budget, proceeded Mr. Brace, was that it did not go far enough, and yet the people were supposed that they could be persuaded to cast their votes against it and thus punish the Government who had introduced it. Mr. Balfour, speaking at Birmingham, said that the one thing necessary for the salvation of the country was Tariff Reform. He (Mr. Brace) was quite prepared to fight an election upon that issue (applause). If he believed for a single moment that Tariff Beform would add one grain of comfort to their homes and families, he would be I Tariff Reformer. But his experience and his attempts to probe this, problem to the bottom had taught him that, instead of being better off, the people would be worsened under Tariff Reform. Why did Tariff Reform starve their fathers and grandfathers P (Applause). Why was it that in countries where Protection reigned the workers were upon a lower standard than in the United Kingdom? Whatever faults existed under the present fiscal system, it was not Tariff Reform that was necessary, but land reform—(loud applause) —and it was because this Budget took the right road towards land reform that he came there that evening without reserva- tion to strongly support it. Whether the Lords rejected the Budget or not, the fight between -the people and the peers would not be put off. It was a scandal and a disgrace that in this enlightened age the people were to be fastened up against reform because there was such a Chamber as the House of Lords. The House of Lords was sup- posed to be a. revising chamber, but in fact it was an offshoot of the Tory Party. If they were to be governed by families, he held that they should have the most sensible of the families sent there. He did not say that the most sensible were there at present, but if they were, they were a poor sample (laughter). They collected all their forces against the Licensing: Bill, and members were brought there whose identity was not known even to the officials of the House. If they acted thus at that time, they would resurrect peers to throw out the Budget (laughter). There was no place in the Constitution for such an assembly as the House of Lords, and the Government had made up its mind to lead the forces of democracy against this huge citadel of privilege and vested interests (applause). Mr. Edgar Jones, M.A., said he was surprised that the Budget was so moderate. The more he thought of it, the more he was surprised that the masses of the people, having begun to under- stand what was at stake, were not crying out for double and treble what was in the Budget. If royalties had to contri- bute to the rates like every other form of property, it would be considerably more than the Is. in the £ Mr. Lloyd George asked. The propsals of this Budget would accomplish more reforms than Tariff Reform would from now until Doomsday. The great thing the peers kicked against was the revaluation of land. The last time it was valued it was entered in the Doomsday Book—(laughter)—this time it would be entered in the book of doom— the doom of injustice (applause).

A Mother's Stony For nearly six months my baby Bessie was covered from head to feet with weeping eczema.. The little, dear's eyes were sealed up. blind for a whole month. The doctor used every remedy that could be found, but the eczema continued in- creasing. The anguish was so great that the dear writhed and tore at herself like a little raving creature, and I had to keep her hands tied down. The doctor gave me no hope of saving her. At last I heard of Cadum. After I had used Cadum three times, the weeping of the eczema. ceased, and the sore coating came off like a linseed poultice. After a few weeks' use of Cadum the child had not a speck left on her. The doctor himself said it was a wonderful cure. Mrs. Bishop, Burton Hill, Malmesbury, Wilts. Cadum is a new medical discovery for the cure of all skin and scalp troubles. It stops the itching at once and begins healing. with the first application. Trial box 6d., large box Is., of chemists or Omega, Ltd., London, N.

Tylorstown. At the Queen's Hotel on Friday, 24th ult., an interesting debate took place between Mr. T. I. Mardy Jones, F.R.S.E., Mardy, and Mr. Noah Ablett, Porth, on the Ruskin College dispute. Mr. Jones defended the college in a masterly manner, whilst Mr. Ablett fought well for the Plebs. On Thursday, 23rd ult., a Tariff Reform meeting was held at Queen's Square. The speaker, Mr. Waddington, took for his subject, Tariff Beform versus the Budget," and was frequently interrupted by the crowd. Three cheers were given for Mr. Lloyd George and the Budget. Mr. Nelmes, of Ferndale, occupied the chair. No resolution was put by the Tariff Reformers.

FERNDALE GENERAL 11 OSPITAL AND EYE JNFIRMARY Patients admitted free on recommendation of the Governors. 1194 Son. Sec.—HENRY DAVIES