Welsh Gazette and West Wales Advertiser

DR. WILLIAMS' SCHOOL. The interesting proceedings at Dolgelley on Tuesday in connection with the celebra- tion of the twenty-first anniversary of Dr. WILLIAMS' Endowed School for Girls will serve to call public attention to one of the 1 most important phases that have character- ized the Welsh Educational Renaissance-viz., the provision that has been made for the higher education of girls, and the en- lightened governors of this important in- stitution, no less than the brilliant Head- mistress and her capable staff are to be heartily congratulated on their efforts to make the re-union worthy of the occasion. The school, although it was only founded 21 years ago, can claim a history, if history is to be measured by achievement Aided from the start by an exceptionally efficient succession of head mistresses, the School has been steered through great difficulties with an unerring hand and a wise judgment, until at the present time it holds an hon- oured, if not a unique, place among Girls' Schools in the Principality. Its great need is money," and it could do with a good many more scholarships, and we have no doubt that, now that its claims are being plainly put before the public, and its abso- lutely unsectarian character 'made known, it will be more liberally treated in the future than it has been in the past. The School can boast of a remarkable record of progress all along the line, but there is no reason why, given increased advantages, it should not eclipse in the future anything it has done in the past.

WORTHY OF EMULATION THE Dolgelley Rural District Council' have taken a step in the right direction in adding to the report of their Medical Officer of Health a copy of model Regulations as to dairies, cowsheds, and milk shops,, together with the recommendations of' the Council. The report has been printed: for- distribu- tion amongst the ratepayers of the district, and its publication eannot fail to do something towards creating a healthy public opinion on matters of vital im- portance to the community at large. The Dolgelley District Council are fortunate in having the services of a Medical Officer who is eminently qualified to speak with authority on questions pertaining; to public health. The science of hygiene- has made vast and rapid strides of late; and it is now considered to be of quite as much importance to pay attention to the conditions which go to the making of a healthy environment, as it is to study specific diseases and preventive medicine. The present year will be memor- able as one that has witnessed a remarkable crusade against tuberculosis throughout the civilised world, and to-day we are not without hope that that terrible scourge of both man and beast will at any rate be considerably reduced, if not utterly stamped out. Even to realise the possibility of overcoming such a dreadful disease as consumption might do much to bring about its prevention and ultimately, let us hope, its extinction. Dr. HUGH JONES calls attention to two erroneous ideas that have prevailed in the past in regard to consumption namely, that it was inherited and that it was incurable; and these miscon- ceptions have, he adds, been largely responsible for the fact that so little has been done up to now towards checking its destructive progress. Black death, which raged and carried away its victims by the thousands in the Middle Ages, has been banished from the land by improved and healthier conditions of life, and leprosy has long ago lost its ancient power through the wise and timely precautions of past genera- tions. If every District Council were to follow the example of Dolgelley and make their contribution towards enlightening the public on sanitary questions, consumption and many another dire disease would not be long in disappearing.

— THE EISTEDDFOD AND NATIONAL LIFE. THE National Eisteddfod of 1899 has just left us, and we are just entering upon a season when a number of local Eisteddfodau are to take place; the moment seems opportune for offering some remarks upon our national gathering and its provincial sisters. We consider it a very noteworthy fact that the time has gone by when the Eisteddfod and eisteddfodwyr were con- sidered fit and proper subjects for contempt and derision. No man with a grain of sense or a particle of self-respect would now dream of decrying the great Welsh institu- tion or of speakin in derogatory terms of similar gatherings held on a smaller scale in small towns and villages. The Anglicised and Anglicising Welshman who paraded his contempt of everything Welsh—we knew him well a. quarter of a century and more ago-is a rare bird now-a-days. An English Philistine, who has come to live amongst us from beyond Offa's dyke, may indeed be now and then found stalking in a superior fashion and airing himself as a very superior person, pouring ridicule upon everything Welsh. But this sort of thing has long since lost its sting, and only rebounds with biting effect on him who is guilty of it. We think the Eisteddfod is greatly to be encouraged, were it only as a means of raising national life. We cherish it as a means of bringing together, though it were only for the brief space of a week, Welshmen of all shades of politics and theology, and of all grades of CIY life. It is well to have a national platform broad enough to hold a bishop of the Established Church and a moderator of the General Assembly, a principal of an Oxford College and a schoolmaster of a country village, a peer of the Realm and a peasant who earns his daily bread by the sweat of his brow. At the Eisteddfod at least, all political and theological differences are lost, and all strive to encourage and attain the very best in literature, in music and in art.. We do not pretend that the Eistedd- fod has yet reached the highest pinnacle of perfection, or that the patrons of it have not fallen at times into mistakes. But of what institution on earth may perfection be predicted, and of whom may it be said that they have not erred ? Parliament is a glorious institution which has come down to us through six centuries. Is it yet perfect ? Are all men who sit in Parliament wise and infallible ? Institutions are not to be con- demned because their advocates have not yet reached the estate of just men made perfect. We do not think the Gorsedd is as old as some of its mcmbers maintain it is; but we may be allowed to state that it is old enough for us, and we think that it has that grandeur and imposing character about it which makes it peculiarly fascinating to the Welsh sentiment; and further, we think that its ceremony may be utilized to deepen patriotism and' to advance the study of Welsh literature. The recent Eisteddfod is considered by some to be unproductive. Perhaps it is rather early to come to this conclusion. We may not have witnessed the rising of another Stephens in prose, or an Islwyn or: Enrrys in verse; but; then it should be remembered that genius does not spring into being like Venus from the. foam of the sea, or Athene in full panoply. from the brain of Zeus. The advocates of local eisteddfodau should be encouraged in every Z!1 y way in their efforts to train up; local talent in the cultivation of music and poetry. Without the smaller eistuitlfodau and competitive meetings, the National Eis- teddfod. were impossible. The young musician has many a time tuned his pipe before- the village audience before attempting his great assay in full view of the national gathering, and the young- poet has times without number tried1 the pitch of his flight," as Dafydd Ionaws beautifully said at a competitive meeting near his home, before soaring for the honours of a chaired bard in tho full blaze that boots upon the platform of the National Eisteddfod. The young girl who won the soprano solo a week ago at Cardiff had previously taken over twenty prizes at local eiîsteddfodau-the former achievements were- but the preparatory steps and training for her latest triumph. Eisteddfodau of some pretensions are being held this week in this neighbourhood, and another is to take place at a proximate date. Who knows that these gatherings may not give a voice to and shed undying distinction upon some hitherto mute, unglorious Milton? Who can tell whether they may not produce an Edith Wynne, or Megan Watts, or Ben Davies, or a Santley We wish the promoters of these meetings every success, financial and otherwise. We are well aware what responsibilities are involved in carrying out successfully undertakings of this nature. The labour entailed, the loss of time, the money expended are often enormous, and the burden has to be borne by a comparatively few shoulders. In the case of the National Eisteddfod, no one who has not been initiated into the mysteries of the inner workings of it, has anything like a conception of the stupendous undertaking which it is. But gigantic though it is, it is well worth all the trouble; and the country is aware of this and will not let it die. The Eisteddfod has all the vitality of youth, and the wisdom and experience of age; and though it has seen the roll of many years, it has not waxed old nor is ready to vanish away. Wales has its Schools, primary and intermediate; it has. its Colleges and its University, and these are doing excellent work on its behalf but Wales cannot do without its Eistedd- fodau, and the more of them the better.

NOTES AND COMMENTS. The new buildings of the Aberystwyth Intermediate School will be opened by Lord Rendel on the 26th October next. The list of successes at the Matriculation Examination of the University of London reflects great credit on the Towyn Inter- mediate School. Three pupils passed in the first division. Colonel Milward stated in the House of Commons on Thursday, that on the Tithes Rent Charge Bill, fifty speeches had been made for- the Government, and two hundred and three from the Opposition benches, of which latter number ninety-one were made by Welsh members. The Rsv. Thomas Johns, Llanelly, has been elected president of -tlie Welsh Congre- gational Union for the ensuing year. The Local Government Board have refused the application made for the issue of a; Pi-o visional Order constituting a Joint Committee to put into operation the Rivers Pollution Prevention Act in the basin of the Dee, on the ground of the continued determined opposition of' Flintshire, Den- bighshire, Merionethshire, and Salop, and- the probability that if such an order-were- granted it would be strongly opposed In. Parliament. At. the annual meeting of the Urban District Council Association, held at Westminster Town Hall last week, a resolution was passed emphatically pro- testing against the recommendations of the Royal Commission on Local Taxation that the general district rate in urban districts should be collected by the poor law guardians. The Council recommended that the whole of the rates should be collected by each district council. The Cardiganshire Joint Police Committee 'is to be congratulated upon the wisdom of its decision in refusing the application of the Aberystwyth Town Council to allow the Chief Constable to form and command a fire brigade at that town.. Considering that the Chief Constable is the servant of the county and not of any particular town in it7 no one will wonder that Mr. D. J. Williams and Mr. David Davies strongly and success- fully objected to allow him to undertake any extraneous duties. Aberayron, in common with many other places, is suflering from the 'scorcher.' Hardly a day passes but we read of some untoward accident through furicus cycling; and no genuine votary of the wheel will demur at the Rev. Evan JNIorris' proposal at the last meeting of the Aberayron Urban District Council to make a bye-law to 0 regulate the speed of cyclists and drivers in that town. The Towyn and Aberdovey District Council and other authorities in the district have put such a bye-law in operation with very satisfactory results. At a meeting of the Cardiganshire Standings Joint Police Committee on Thursday, it was resolved to call the attention of Mr. David Thomas, Pantcoch Villa, to the fact that it.. was the wish of that Committee and of the Quarter Sessions that occasional licences should be granted only at the Petty Sessions. Mr. H. C. Fryer, the clerk, pointed out that one of the evils of granting such licences out of Petty Sessions was that they were often, as in the case under consideration, granted' for longer hours. Mr. Thomas granted the, licence on the day before the Petty Sessions. were held. Many a magistrate has good reason to be glad that he does not live in Utopia; for it is the recorded opinion of Sir Thomas More that all magistrates and councillors who should act outside the. council or sitting of their brethren should be beheaded The monthly comparative. statement of pauperism for May last, issued last Thursday, states that the number of paupers in receipt of relief in that month was, notwithstanding the increase in population, less in each week than in the corresponding weeks of thirty- four of the forty-two preceding years.. The proportion which the paupers bore to the population of the country in the last week of May, 1899, was smaller than in any of the other years since 1857, being 21'8 to-the 1,000. In 1863, when the-proportion was. highest, it reached 48-3 to the. 1,000, and in every year from 1857 to 1871 it was over 40 to the 1,000. The largest decreases were in the Welsh Division, where they amounted to 19-0, 22*3, 25-6,, and 28-9 per cent. respectively, for the four weeks of the month, but this is due to the fact that in the corresponding weeks of the preceding year there was unusal distress in a part of that division caused by the stoppage of collieries in Monmouth and' South Wales. The first number of The Woman s Agricidturai Times, edited by the Countess of Warwick, has just made its appearance, It is- in every respect an excellent monthly, with a splendid mission. In the introductory article on The new ivomen and old acres," the Countess of Warwick says that in place oi? the old 'hard labour for life' system of farming lar ge areas, with heavy machinery and much harnessing of horses, and driving of carts long distances to the railway over bad roads, there is to-day already a successful emergence of la petite culture, taking the direction of flowers, of fruit, of jam-making,. of bee-keeping, and especially of poultry- farming. All this work can be well attended to by women, who only need training to. become prosperous and contented in that country. In many city occupations, in typ91 writing, as telegraph clerks, and in the professions, women have found their opportunity. The Countess is convinced that, if assisted and directed at the start, women will do equally well if planted on [ the soil. f | The Birmingham Mail says that a clergy- man at a suburban church last Sunday electrified his congregation by asking for their prayers on behalf of Joseph Chamberlain. What could it mean ? was the question which suggested itself to all present. Had the right hon. gentleman been stricken down by some irate burgher at the suggestion of President Kruger, or had one of the Opposition seriously assulted him in the House of Commons ? And the clergyman, not knowing the flutter he had caused, commenced to offer up the required prayer, never for a moment attempting to explain that the person referred to was not the- Colonial Secretary, but a simple parishioner who was ill with the typhoid fever. It was only when the service was over that the true state of things was forthcoming. It would not have been amiss for the congregation to. remember the Colonial Secretary as well in. their prayers. He is in sore need these troublous days of that grace known to old Welsh divines as "gras attaliol." In The Woman's Agricultural Times, Sir James Blythe, writing on "women and igricultui-e says that—" If the regeneration of agriculture is to be, as we must all hope it will be, effected in this country, it must be looked for in the cultivation of minor agricultural commodities, and in the more general employment of female labour. The time has long gone by when the British farmer could rely upon producing corn each year at a profit, since the growing of wheat, and indeed all varieties of corn, is open to the whole civilised world. Among the industries complisecl in cultivation of the smaller agricultural produqts a principal place must be given to that of dairying, including milk-producing, butter-making, and cheese-making; and in lesser degree poultry and egg-producfeion, and flower, fruit, and vegetable growing. In each of these branches of ^agriculture the compara- tively close proximity between producers and consumers in the United Kingdom gives the British fanner an undoubted advantage over his foroign or colonial competitors, since the perishable character of these commodities makes their freshness more oy less a matter of necessity day by day.