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From the point of view of the advocates of Local Veto some such step as State Purchase is in my judgment essential. Without it we shall run great risk of con- tinuing to be baffled and defeated as we have been for the last 50 years. The most we could hope for would be that we should get the power of Veto at the end of a very long time notice but we want that power now, not in a dim and uncertain future. And when we did get the power what a difference there would be in inducing the people to use it if we got rid of the existing direct personal financial interest in the trade. Now we have, and, if the present conditions continued we should then have a large army of employees in breweries, distilleries, and licensed premises openly, vigorously, aggressively active at election times from morning to night during and out of business hours. Added to them we have and should have the employers of these people, together with another large army of shareholders and their relatives and dependents highly organised and deeply interested, bringing all possible pressure on everyone they can influence. Election funds, subsidised candidates, literature, canvassers, conveyances, not to mention more subtle and less legitimate methods we now have and should then have to contend with. Under State ownership and control the existing large, influential, wealthy, and widely distributed army of brewers, distillers, shareholders, and their friends would disappear as a special and interested electioneering force. There would not be any trade funds, trade candidates, or trade electioneering. So long as the trade exists there will be persons employed in it who will have an interest in its continuance. That is unavoidable, but the character and extent of that interest and influence under State Ownership and Control would be a very mild echo of the THERE were only a few who called him David, his father, the minister, and those whose interest in him was of a benevolently official character. We at school called him Dai or D.R., his initials, in true Welsh fashion. His mother, and those who cared for him most, called him Davy, and later some of his English friends found the name Dave for him. Now, looking back, I fancy the last suited him best of all. It suggests just that idea of softness tinged with the spirit of adventure which characterised him. I remember our meeting well. He was then ten, and was just convalescent from an attack of Rheumatic Fever. I had gone to the woods to find chestnuts and came, quite by chance, upon a party of woodmen hauling timber. He was amongst them, riding in one of the waggons. These men, muscular, hardened, loud-voiced, foul-tongued, and with many vicious habits, were amongst the roughest I have seen. The contrast between them and the boy was striking; he looked so frail, pale and wasted, with noticeably blue eyes. It was wonderful and surprising to notice the consideration, kindness, and even softness that these conditions with which we have to contend now. Public- houses and publicans would be vastly fewer than they are now, and in the houses any attempt at electioneering would be strictly prohibited, and there would be no such thing as making licensed premises centres of an active and more or less corrupt propaganda. No one suggests that there would be no difficulty, but all the adverse con- ditions, and influences would be reduced to a minimum. As for the rest, as practical men we have to deal with facts as they are. Someone will sell drink until the nation can be persuaded to abolish the sale. The pro- blems we have to face are-Who is that someone to be ? How can the sale be most effectively controlled? How can free scope be given to the best instincts of the nation with regard to one of the most vital and difficult problems of our social, economic, and industrial life in the grave times in which we are now living, and those which are before us in the immediate future ? By all means prohibit the trade whenever and wherever we can, but until we can, and where we cannot do this it should be our aim, as it is our duty, to so arrange the control of the trade as to render it as little injurious as possible. Many of us believe that where there is drink there is danger, and that no conditions as to the place where or the persons by or for whom it is sold can alter the nature of the liquor and the effect it will have upon those who consume it; but we all know that facilities and temptations may be extended or curtailed, and drink- ing and its attendant evils may be encouraged or checked with the result that the consumption of that which we believe to be injurious may be substantially increased or diminished. Our duty as to the direction in which we should move is clear. Thos. P. Whittaker. DAVID roughened, undisciplined men of many vices, showed him. Like any boy I was lured by the waggons and thereupon began our friendship. I came to know him very well after this, for we were at the same school. To everyone, except perhaps his mother and himself, his school-days were a disappointment. He accomplished so little and achieved no distinction. And yet he was so full of plans not the plans of the ambitious person, for no call whatever was made upon any intellectual powers he possessed. It was all a superficial interest. It could hardly be said that he was indolent, for he was troubled about many things. There was a certain eagerness about him the eagerness of no settled purpose; the eagerness of the child; but no energy, none of the quiet determination which comes of having a settled goal. He left school at sixteen without taking any of the Junior Examinations. This failure was due altogether to the illness mentioned. It has never been sufficiently recognised nor emphasised in fiction or biography-the great influence of ill-health in determining