TT. a A SATURDAY, DECEMBER 13, 1923, Thought ® for a Chilas Welfare > Always includes fd SCOTTS | NS EMULSION an more cars of the wood we were famous for last year. Cut 13" per. loa Our WELSH COAL is meeting with praise from every user -- 6.50 per ton. No clinkers, very ash and great heat, W. A. Mitchell & Co | no man is a hero to his valet, the as- | too | once that Sir John Carling--who was, | Before placing your order for a Monument, or having Let- tering dome in cemetery SEE J. E. Mullen 161 Frontenac St., Kingston . Phone 1417. 7 T h | RECOLLECTIONS OF A PRIVATE, SECRETARY : By J. L. PAYNE. : Early Newspaper Days and Men--S8ir James Edgar's Trained Political Choir--The Private Secretary, His Duties, Painful and Otherwise--Civil Service and Patronage, 3 { He read but one book in his life, and s ARTICLE IL It is an old and familiar saying that that was "John Halifax, Gentleman," He often spoke of it, and when I asked sumption being that the latter sees him him why he did not take up other often it his bad moments. If! gems of literature, he said very frank- that be true, it ought to follow that a! ly. "J understand "John Halifax" is private secretary has equally good op-' one of the greatest books in the Eng- portunities for the discovery of any-! lish language, and I would not care to thing in the nature of a dual person-| lose the impression it made on my I want to say at| mind." He liked checkers, cards. I should explain, until 1893 plain Hon. Scores of times we battled over the Mr. Carling--impressed me as a gentle-| board until past midnight, and he in- man when I first met him, and he re- ! variably finished by siaying: "The mained so in. my eyes to the end of | game of checkers is Jike the game of my long relations with him. | life. Everybody is trylng to win, and He was the gentlest man I ever: everybody else is trying to checkmate knew, and one of the most considerate.! him." There is something in his phil- If anything makes a man a gentleman, | osophy, we must all admit. He found it that does. He was physically a big} so, both in -politics and business. He man, with urbanity radiating from ev-| was a large property owner; but los- ery curve of the rather handsome and | ses by fire and through competition clean-shaven face. Among his friends| kept him from ever being a very rich he was known as "Honest John Carl-| man. If I were to sum up his strength ing," and well-deserved the flattering and highest qualifications as a Cabinet sobriquet. He was pure gold in that| Minister, I should say that they lay in| regard. 1 am rather disposed to en- | his rugged common sense and intuitive large upon his social virtues, because | judgment of men. In my association simple candor will prevent my ranking | with him in a confidential capacity I him in other respects with some of the| always found him kind and grateful, brilliant and brainy men who will] and in the final reckoning, who could march in these sketches. fail to love a man like that? Those are He was Postmaster General when 1} qualities which one remembers when joined him in 1885, and I am not only | conspicuous ability and brilliant states- confident that We was misplaced, but | manship have faded into the mists of that he felt himself to be. The Post} forgetfulness. Office Department admits of little in the way of initiative, or of big under- takings. ality in his chief. but not Sir John was of that type of | Feared Being Trapped men who are natural-born contractors, As these memoirs, or recollections, and, as I have observed, such men are ve intended to cast a sidelight on the | usually of exceptional physique. They characteristics of certain eminent men, | are at home with large plans and large | as I came to know them by very inti- enterprises. In the Ontario Govern- | mate contact, I think I should say that ment he had been Minister of Public g;. John Carling had two obsessions. Works from 1867 to 1871, and had| There are few men who have not carried out the opening up of Musko-| something peculiar in their make-up. ka anda huge drainage scheme in the | The first was a persistent and domin- County of Essex. In private life he was | jo fear that he would in some way, | at the head of what was at one HME |r 3¢ some time, be shut up in a room | the largest brewing. organization | or pyilding from which he could not Canada, and in his heart he loved the | roigily escape. For that reason he things that were big. Yet he was a shy'| never' crossed the ocean. He said he | man, not in the slightest degree asser-| g)p50c understood that when rough tive, and fond of approbation. weather came on the hatches were In the course of two or three months iphitened down; and when I asked him | after I went to Ottawa he was trans-| why Le feared such a thing he said:, ferred to the Department of Agricul- "Tf 1 were below, and could not get ture, made vacant by the translation of 5 on deck, I should go mad in an Hon. John Henry Pope to the De- hour." partment of Railways, and Canals, | doubt that he both conceived and de- 1 pularity among all the members. | tinguished figure in any drawing room, I was once with him at a great poli- | Here Sir John was at home. In thel ior demonstration in Stratford, at literal sense he found a field to his liking, and toward the end of 1885 he was busily planning that vast system of experimental farms which has done so much for the husbandmen of Can- ada. In that system Sir John Carling has an enduring and a merited monu- ment; since there is not the slightest veloped the thing as we have it to- day. Loved Seeing Things Grow. Sir John Carling loved to see things grow. That implies patience. He could plan a thing, or plant a thing, and wait without a murmur for ten or twenty years to see it come into full Being or fruition. Many an after- noon Sir John took me out to what is now the Central Experimental Farm to watch the stumps being blown up by dynamite. It was generally so ar- ranged that from twenty to fifty were held back so that he could see them go skyward. It was a rough place when work on it hegan in the spring of 1886. It is now one of the most beau- tiful gardens in the world. In Parliament Sir John seldom took any part in the debates. He was not a good speaker; yet outside of the House he loved to make speeches. He was fond of statistics, and yet strange to say, had no gift whatever for the handling of figures. While Minister of Agriculture, he laid the foundation of what is now the Dominion Bureau of Statistics. He had no trouble whatever in getting his estimates through Par- liament, because of his abounding be e never said a harsh thing in his life, and therefore had no enemies. He was a partisan. Men of out- spoken catholicity find no places in party Cabifiets. But he would as soon do a faver for an opponent as for a Conservative. As I look back, there was little of what could be called rank partisanship in departmental adminis- tration at Ottawa. What I saw was every. minister anxious to do some- thing that would be creditable to him- self as the head of a department of Government. On the whole, I. formed a very bad impression of the game of politics; but that impression grew very largely out of my experience in elec- tions, rather than out of anything I saw behind the scenes of official life. . Brewer, But Abstainer. Although he would have been a 'dis- and was by every instinct a courtier, -Sir John cared nothing for society. He liked to give an occasional dinner party, and enjoyed a not-too-frequent dinner at other people's tables; but which Sir John Macdonald and Sir John Thompson weré the principal speakers. Ther had been a procession, | and when the visiting party reached the town hall, the building was jam med to the outer doors. The "question was how to get the big men in. That was finally settled by having them walk on: the shoulders 6f the crowd right to the platform--a thing 1 never saw doné¢ but that once in all my cam- paign experiences. Knowing about my chief's dread of imprisonment, | ask- ed him how he felt while hemmed in by the throng at the door, and he said: "If a man in a balloon had come over my head, and had offered to lift me out in exchange for all I owned in the world, I should not have hesitated for a moment." The other was an overpowering ap- prehension that he might in some way be made ridiculous. I remember once he addressed a meeting in a western Ontario town hall, and, although 1 had seen him do badly on other oc- casions, this time he was in distress from start to finish. As we came away. I ventured to say that he had scarcely done himself justice. "You surely saw that stovepipe which ran above my head. 1 had just got nicely started when it caught my eye, and 1 thought how people would laugh ii it should fall and cover me with soot." I then realized how difficult it was for him to keep one eye on the notes he held in his hand and the other on the threatening stovepipe. Had Two Songs. I frequently heard him sing at pub- lic dinners or in drawing rooms; for he had a sweet tenor voice. But he was as selective in his songs as he was in his reading, and had but two--'"The Red White and Blue" and "Pulling Hard Against the Stream." The chorus of the latter ran like this: "Then do you best for one ahother, Making life a pleasant dream; Help a worn and weary brother Pulling hard against the stream." 1 do not remember to have ever heard him sing that song without his explaining that he liked it for its sen- timent. That sentiment was his reli- gion. He was a Methodist, in denomin. ational classification; but really never HE DAILY BRITISH WHIG A Merry Py. Careful and Carefree rather a small, though important, cir- cle. He was not a traveller, and there- fore had seen nothing of the big world about which he read. He was, never- weary brother was the sum of his prac- tical Christianity, and, speaking for myself, I always felt he was not far from the kingdom. Sir John Carling was not only a! theless, a well-informed man of an truly great Minister of Agriculture, but | iritensely practical type who attacked he was born of Yorkshire stock on al his problems methodically and brought farm in London Township in 1828 and | to bear on them a sound judgment. He { had his oddities; but he also had his sweet and rare virtues. He was the first! Minister 1 served and it is a delight | now, as events and men are given truer value in perspective, to pay to his me- mory the homage of a warm place in later became the owner of a large farm on the outskirts of the city of London. | He loved the outdoors and the soil | and the things that grew in it. As| London expanded therescame a time | when the city was selected as the lo-| | cation for a military school. The Gov-| my heart.. Politics would be cleaner ernment had a block of ordnance land | and freer from rancor if we had more in the heart of the residential district | public men like the late Sir John Carl- on which it was proposed to set up this | ing. He was my political Saint John. school, but that would not be popular | (To Be Continued.) nor quite suitable. So the city of Lon- | don bought hali of the Carling farm | and took in exchange the ordnance | AUSE OF SICKNESS land. Everybody was satisfied. THE C E All but Hon. Edward Blake. When | Parliament met in the following Janu-| Almost Always Due to Weak and ary he had something, ih that satirical Impoverished Blood. language of which he was a master, to | say about the transaction. "I under-| Apart from accident or illness due stand," he said, "that since the last!to infection, almost all f{ll-health meeting of this House a somewhat | arises from one or two reasons. The peculiar deal in land has taken place | mistake that people make is in not between the city of London and the | realizing that both of these have the Government whereby the Minister of | same cause at the root, namely poor Agriculture has parted with his farm [plood. Either bloodlessness or some for a big price. It is true the Minister | other trouble of the nerves will be did not himself figure in the matter; |gound to be the reason for almost a ---- Promptly relieves Indigestion, Biliousness, Headaches, Constipation and Rheumatism, 25¢. and 50c. a box: FRUIT-A-TIVES LIMITED, Ottaw Ogdensburg, N.Y, -- Londen, Bang, -- Chri Ont. , NE. Many attractive and inexpensive Christmas gifts at PRINCESS PHARMACY That Convenient Corner Drug Store AND DIVISION CROSS" Do Trifles Annoy and Upset You Do You Have Frequent Headaches £ Do You Quarrel With Those YouLove Do You Jump When the Door Slams @ Well Known Hospital Physician Says These Are Some of the = Danger Signals of Exhausted Nerve Force--What To Do One of the most terrible of all hu- eyes, in the heart, the small of the back; in the first symptoms are mental instead of - worry over trifies, or inability to concentrate on your work. The nervous mother is upset by her children, squabbles with her hus- of the "blues" it The discovery of iron Trad Panic iron #8 the most valuable red blood making scientific discoveries since the erea- tion of modern medical science, and its effect in helping to create new y nerve force and revitalise worn-out, w: - re Prema ------ halls to students in 1346. The Black | linshead's "Chronicles," King Henry Prince was among its alumni. Henry | II. "served his son at the table as V., Cardinal Beaufort, Addison, |server,'bringing up the boar's head Wycherly and scores of others whose | with trumpets before it according to names are deeply chiselled in the | the manner." tablets of history attended the old i Institution. ESKIMOS' CHRISTMAS * At Queen's the procession of the a e boar's head forms in the buttery. A| gomebody has said that when the former did much at it. To help a worn and but I am quite prepared to believe that the money (tapping his pocket) never- theless reached the right spot." Sir John Macdonald, in reply, said: "The honorable leader of the Opposi- tion intimates that the Minister = of Agriculture has parted with his farm. I know nothing about the matter: but, he is probably correctly informed. He implies, however, that the Minister of Agriculture received a big price for his farm. 1 do not know whether he did or not; but I hope he did--I sincerely hope he did. But (turning and pointing to his colleague) does any one in this House for a moment believe there was anything crooked in anything Honest John Carling had to do with?" That ended the matter. What Blake had tried to magnify into a scandal was never heard of again.--I recount this) incident because it fairly reveals oid Sir John in a characteristic light. He did not attempt to quibble or debate the point as to whether or not his Minister of Agriculture had received a big figure for his farm, but showed his human side ih that frank "But I hope he did." That was one reasom why Sir John Macdonald commanded such de- votion and loyalty from those who were associated with him, Sir John Carling was knighted in 1893 and at the same time gave up his portfolio and retired to the Senate. He had for the second timé in his life sui- fered defeat, though by a narrow ma- jority, this time at the hands of Mr. C. S. Hyman, who afterwards becajne Minister of Public Works in the Government of Sir Wilirid Laurier, succeeding Hon. James Sutherland. } am confident from what he told me that he would have preferred to re- main in office and forego the title; but he knew all about party exigencies and was a good soldier. Although he came every session to Ottawa, I say but little afterwards of my gentle and lov- able old chief. He lived to be 84, al. though his declining days saw him considerably disabled by a-fall he had in his bath. He has sat, with but a single break in the Legislature of On. tario or the House of Commons for thirty-six years. He spent a long and "useful life in ( every ailment. If you are pale, suf- fering from headaches, or breathless- ness, with palpitation of the heart, poor appetite and weak digestion, the cause is almost always poor blood. If you have nervous headaches, neural- | gid sciatica and other nerve pains, | the Cause is exhausted nerves. But | run down nerves are also a result of poor blood, so that the two chief causes of illness are one and the same. If your health is poor; if you are pale, nervous or dyspeptic, you should give Dr. Williams' Pink Pills a fair trial. These pills act directly on the blood, and by enriching it {give new strength to worn out | nerves. Men and women alike great- ly benefit through the use of this medicine. If you are weak or ailing, {give Dr. Williams' Pink Pills a fair trial and you will be pleased with the beneficial results that will speed. ' tly follow. | It your dealer does not keep these | pills you can get them by mail at 50 cents a box from The Dr. Williams' Medicine Co., Brockville, Ont. BOAR' HEAD PROCESSION Ancient Christian Ceremony Still Observed at Queen's College, Oxford University. Why do the English eat suckling pig on Christmas? This dish finds its explanation in another ahcient and now almost extinct Christmas custom --+the Yuletide ritual of bringing in ths boar's head. No royal or baron- ial feast was complete without this elaborate ceremony. ' Queen Victoria retained the old custom at both Osborn House and Windsor, and never seated herself at the Christmas board without first witnessing the procession of the boars head. It is not celebrated widely in Great Britain to-day, and vives with something of its old-time glory is Queen's College, Oxford Uni- versity. : The custom is believed to ante- dafe Christianity; in tact, is said to have cone down to Englishmen from the Druids. Freya, goddess of péace and plenty, was always represented as riding 'a boar, and the Druid priests are believed to have made yearly sacrifices of boars to this divihity in order to win her good will, 3 \ deni Allegorical - Legends and traditions ' cluster about this ancient rite. At Queen's suddenly a wild boar rushed at him. College the tals runs that-a student soloist, who usually is a student of the college, heads the line. Béhind him march two or three broad shouldered youths who bear the boar's head, mounted on a silver salvey. weighed as much as eighty pounds, Flags and pennants of the college flutter about the head, which is crowned with gilded sprays of rose- mary, bay, laurel and other ever- greens. A lemon or an orange, the old Norse symbol of plenty, is placed between the tusks. Behind the bearers of the salver march the surpliced men pnd boys of the choir and the orgahist in a robe 'of an Oxford doctor of music. On a dais at the end of the dining hall the provost and the principal guests stand. The provost says grace in Latin; the call to dinner is sounded with trumpets through the cloisters, and the procession starts through the cloisters. The soloist sings: The boar's head bear I Bedecked with bays and rose- mary, And 1 pray you, my masters, be merry. To this the choir responds with the Latin words of an ancient Christ- mas carol: \ Qot estis in convivio, Caput apri defero, Reddeus laudes Domino. Home-made Ale. By the time they have finished the carol the procession will have ar- rived at the dais. Then the salver is placed upan a high table prepared for this purpose. The provost re- moves the flags. The same flags are used year after year. To the guests who stand beside him on the dais he gives sprigs of the gilded evergreens. Those which remain he throws to the centre of the hall to be scrambled for by the guests of lesser importance. The ceremonial then is over and dinner is served. There are special sauces and the food ig served in heavy silver plate. Home-made ale and a brew of great potency peculiar to the college called "Queen's own special brew" are served In valuable probably the only place where it sur- Lol tankards. . The procession in mediaeval times was headed by trumpeters, musi- cians and huntsmen bearing spears. They would precede the master cook and pages, carrying mustard jars an the boar's head. _ : As early as 1170, according to Hol- In the old days the head | world was being made the Creator = gathered up all the waste material) he had left over and made Labras dor out of it. Some people say the Creator never intended it to be ins habited. But inhabited it is with & sturdy taciturn band of who, thanks to the Morayian miss = sionaries who have penetrat that country, celebrate Christmas it their Qwn peculiar way. * As service time in the church = draws near all the inhabitants, old * and young, the men on one side and 4 Eskimos, the women on the other, are walt = ing in eager expectation. It is quite dark by four o'clock and the bell rings. All come: troopfng in clad in the best ciothes they can muster, = No one stays at home from these = services unless he is sick or lame, + and whenever it is possible sleight are used to bring these disibled ones to church. N 5 For the little children the happiest part of the service comes later, when each child receives a lighted candle symbolizing the light of the world, * Each candle stands in a white turnip which serves as a candlestick, Most of the candles are made from deer tallow which the Eskimos bring to the missionaries. After the services the children eat not only the turnip, = but what is left of the candle as well, One year only about ten persons, mostly men, could come from the nearest island. Thé ice had been driven together, and rather y miss the Christmas service, they risked their Tives in crossing over on that moving, heaving, bfoken ice to the mainland. ~ They had to climb 3 4 on the mountains and walk through the = % deep snow until they reached the mission station, 'after twenty-three hours of danger and a fearfully hausting march through the snow. How happy they were to be fx time to celebrate the Christmas 4 tival in the house of their About six days later, when the lee had formed, all the rest. of the people came, but oh, 50 sad an downhearted. Like littls ch they told the missionaries their Be of sorrow. They described how sad they all had been when they f that it would be impossible to to the mission for the Christmas vice, Nr 3 SE ------------ There is no policy Ike politen 5 sifice a good manver offen su # where the best tongue his failed, A little sald and truly.said 43 = gorical and is believed to represent of eivil oF. a2 an at 3 TG :