The Government of the United States has sent to Germany what President Wilson has correctly described as a virtual ultimatum, and there can be no doubt as to what the issue of it will be.
Germany has received her final warning from Washington.
She has been formally notified that unless the illegal campaign which she has been conducting by means of her submarines is ended her diplomatic relations with the United States will be severed.
The form which her answer will take may probably be inferred from the statement by Count Bernstorff that in no circumstances will she give up her submarine warfare.
Germany has temporised and quibbled and prevaricated for months past over the representations that have been made to her by the United States respecting the indefensibility, on both legal and moral grounds and on the grounds of humanity, of the submarine warfare which she has waged indiscriminately against ships of war and merchant vessels, against belligerents and neutrals, against women and children as well as against men.
Her disingenuousness and hypocrisy throughout the whole of the negotiations have been repeatedly exposed.
She has offered assurances without apparently having had the smallest intention of making them good.
She has given undertakings with apparently every intention to break them at the earliest possible opportunity.
She has added mendacity to insincerity.
When forced into a corner by the irrefutable evidence that has been accumulated against her she has unblushingly and shamelessly, with the facility of an Ananias, lied and lied again . . .
• Sunday school workers gathered in great numbers at the Burns Hall on Thursday night for the purpose of inaugurating the Dominion Easter Conference of the Presbyterian Church.
The unprecedented size of the gathering, coupled with the spirit of deep earnestness that prevailed, afforded ample evidence of the increased attention that is being devoted to Sabbath school matters, and also gave promise that the subsequent deliberations of the conference would be productive of valuable results.
Careful preparation had evidently been made for the holding of the conference, and this was manifested in a registration of considerably over 450 delegates.
This made the gathering the largest and most important Presbyterian Sunday School Conference that has ever been held in Australasia.
• "It is positively sinful,'' declared Miss F. J. Ross, of Columba College, last night, "that young girls should be allowed out night after night, sometimes without proper guardianship, amid gay scenes and excitements, when they should be preserving every atom of strength, if not for their present, at least for their future needs. So much liberty is given to our young people nowadays,'' she continued, "that there arises a craving for pleasure, a mania for excitement. Wherever our girls are they perhaps wish to go somewhere else. This aimless discontent shows the necessity for a richer, fuller life. If the nervous system of the girl does not get the rest she requires in her early teens, how can she be anything else but nervous when she grows up to womanhood?''
This was perhaps the most heartily applauded passage in an address in which Miss Ross displayed rare gifts of eloquence and oratory in speaking on the subject that has been her life-study.
The address was given to the Presbyterian Sunday School Conference on the importance and needs of the girl in her early teens.
• On Wednesday afternoon a traction engine belonging to Messrs Hulton Bros., of Miller's Flat, which was returning after delivering a load of wheat at Beaumont station, went through the bridge on the main road near Mrs Ross Stevenson's.
The structure collapsed completely, and the engine came to rest almost in an upright position.
Immediately behind the engine was a truck, containing a number of bags of coal, and when the rear of the engine went down the truck and coal were shot over the top of the cab.
The driver and fireman escaped with a few bruises; their escape from serious injury was miraculous.
The driver fortunately had the presence of mind to shut off the steam as he felt the bridge give way, and this fact probably averted serious injury to himself and companion.
The accident resulted in a complete block of heavy traffic, of which there was a good deal on the road.
Mr Edie (county engineer) motored out immediately word of the accident reached Lawrence, and he was fortunate in securing a large gang of men to commence the construction of a by-road at an early hour on Thursday morning.
It will be a week or more before the bridge is replaced. In the meantime, should the weather remain fine, the slight detour will not seriously inconvenience the traffic. - ODT, 22.4.1916.
