'Eclipse or Empire.'

For example, there are towns in England page 17 on which there are thousands of tons of soot thrown out of chimneys which fall in those towns every year. The air is bad—everything is bad for the maintenance of human life. Now, we are placed in New Zealand in a peculiarly good position so far as energy is concerned. We have so many storehouses of water in our lakes and rivers that by transmitting water-power into electricity, we would be able to provide all the energy, all the firing, all the light necessary for 12 million or 20 million of people from our water-power. If we were to create this water-power into electricity we could have smokeless cities, clear, sweet, and clean; and the result, as far as regards the health of the people and in the enjoyment, of the people, would be surprising. This is within our reach if we choose to be patriotic and efficient. With electrical energy utilised we could have all our factories clear of coal dust, and we would not see men with blackened faces and grimy clothes pouring out of our factories at the close of the day. Even where electrical energy is not used, there are some factories in America where arrangements are made for factory hands to change their clothes. Each hand has a cupboard for the purpose of keeping his clothes. He goes into the factory clean and comes out clean, leaving his dirty clothes behind; and in many factories there are hot baths for all the factory hands to use before they put on their clean clothes and go out of the factory and go to their homes. Why should we not have such a system in New Zealand? There is