Cylchgronau Cymru

Chwiliwch trwy dros 450 o deitlau a 1.2 miliwn o dudalennau

draws from the State for the purposes of Univer- sity Education, not twice, but nearly four times, and Ireland 31 times, what Wales now gets. Even when the now contemplated additional £ 20,000 a year is granted to the Welsh Univer- sity and its Colleges, Wales will be still far behind Scotland and Ireland in the matter of State aid. Take again the case of agricultural education. The total expenditure on agricultural education in Scot- land (excluding expenditure on Veterinary Colleges), in 1914-15 was £ 38,692. Of this, £ 7,741 came from the Whisky money, and the rest from the Parliamen- tary Grants. In Wales for the same year, the cor- responding expenditure was 114,179 of which £ 4,014 came from the rates, and the rest from Parliamentary Grants. During the years 1901 to 1913, Scotland received from the agricultural colleges £ 173,000, whereas Wales received during the same period about £ 29,000. The grants made to Irish Colleges amount to £ 230,000, whilst Wales receives only £ 50,000. The Building Grants made to various countries are interesting. I regret that I have not been able to find figures later than 1909. Up to that date Wales has only had some £ 30,000. In the Irish University Act of 1908, Ireland got £ 230,000 by way of building grants. In 1868, the University of Glas- gow had a grant of 1120,000 from the Government. Take again the case of Libraries and Museums these in other countries have been built and are being maintained by the Government. Not so in Wales. The only contribution that has been promised by the Government so far to Wales is half the cost of main- tenance. Again in Ireland, Scotland and England, you will find public parks, botanic gardens, geological survey offices, observatories, Royal Colleges of Science, etc., all maintained by the Government. There are no such public buildings in Wales, except perhaps the THE CONCERT ALL day I had walked along the moorland towards the sea until just as darkness was blotting out the landscape I walked into the village. A dull oil lamp was burning, and as I came up to it, I could see it pointed the way into the little school. Acting on an impulse, I turned aside and walked through the open door, to find myself amongst the audience of a concert about to begin. A few people stared at me as I sat down at the back, but that was all. A grey-haired Vicar was speaking from the little platform at the other end of the room. He was reading a Roll of Honour, reading the names of Inland Revenue Offices which takes away as much revenue as possible out of the Principality. The question suggests itself why have Scotland and Ireland received such preferential treatment in the matter of Government Grants ? Wales has done better than England as far as local effort is concerned, and immeasurably better than Ireland. As far as I can see there can be only one answer to the question. The claims of Scotland and Ireland have been pressed upon Parliament with greater persistency and greater force by the representatives of the two countries than have the claims of Wales by Welsh representa- tives. If Wales had in the past more statesmen of the type of Henry Richard and Tom Ellis, the history of education in Wales would have been vastly different. For my own part, I am convinced that before justice is done to Wales, we must have a Minister for Wales who will continually press the claims of Wales upon the Treasury, and whose pride and pleasure it will be to secure as large a contribution as possible from the Imperial Treasury for the Princi- pality. The Treasury, like the Kingdom of Heaven, must be taken by force, and it is the application of constant pressure to the Treasury that has secured the large grants both for educational and other pur- poses in Ireland and Scotland. No patriotic Welsh- man can read the history of Wales between the Act of Union and the middle of the nineteenth century without a mingled feeling of sorrow or shame it is to a large extent a chapter of lost opportunities. Drych o dristwch yw edrych drosti." Since the beginning of the National Revival, the claims of Wales have been advocated in the Imperial Parliament with a force and effect unknown before but even now Wales has received but a small instal- ment of what in justice and equity it is entitled to. those from the parish who had laid down their lives for their country. The list came to an end, and there was silence. Then a few further remarks enlightened me. The concert was to provide funds for a war shrine. The entertainment began. A tall thin girl came forward to play the piano. Strange to say the piano was a good one, and she played well. She played one of Chopin's Nocturnes, a famous nocturne in which the composer haunts us with a refrain that rings out again and again. You think it has gone for ever. lost amidst the crashing harmonies of the