248 LIFE OF SIR JOHN LUBBOCK ch. 



The present Government have, in effect, committed 

 themselves to the poHcy, which, in my opinion, is a 

 disastrous one. Asquith will, no doubt, try to discover 

 a moderate solution of the difficulty, and it may perhaps 

 be possible to do something in the way of the encourage- 

 ment of thrift by the State. I have always been in 

 favour of discriminating between deserving and un- 

 deserving poverty, and mitigating to some extent the 

 severity of the workhouse system. But this is a widely 

 different thing from what is asked for by the Trades 

 Union Congress. 



My object in writing, however, is not to express my 

 views upon a subject of which I have no special know- 

 ledge, but to ask you where one can get Blackley's 

 paper, to which you and others have referred. I see 

 you speak of no less than five public Inquiries into the 

 subject of old age pensions. Is there any one of these 

 which is more deserving of careful study than the rest, 

 or is there any witness whose evidence is particularly 

 worth reading ? 



The note of warning which you sounded in the 

 House of Lords, in the debate upon the Appropriation 

 Bill, was indeed needed. — Yours sincerely, 



Lansdowne. 



The Right Hon. Lord Avebury. 



In November he was asked to send across the 

 Atlantic a message of goodwill on the successful 

 installation of wireless telegraphy spanning the 

 great ocean, and this message, which appeared 

 in the New York Times of October 18, was the 

 first ever thus transmitted. 



The same month he was elected Rector of 

 St. Andrews University for the following year, in 

 succession to Mr. Andrew Carnegie, who writes 

 him in congratulation : 



Two East Ninety-First Street, 

 New York, November 12ih, 1907. 



Dear Lord Avebury — Hearty congratulations upon 

 your election as Lord Rector of Saint Andrews 

 University. 



