Diário de Lisboa
- Letter from Geneva
- Secondary-school pupils complain
- On Rua do Mundo
The Geneva letter welcomes Germany into the League while acknowledging an unresolved dispute over permanent seats and the positions of Brazil and Spain. Beside it, domestic notes question an overloaded secondary-school science curriculum and report repeated tram fires on Rua do Mundo. International optimism and everyday demands for better public services share the same page.
The Geneva letter’s opening argument, plus the complete short notes on school programmes and tram fires. Later League proceedings and the other sidebar items are not fully translated.
Translation
A Geneva letter welcomes Germany while describing an unresolved crisis
LETTER FROM GENEVA
Today will go down as a historic date. Germany’s entry into the League of Nations marks the beginning of a new direction in European politics.
The celebrated Locarno agreements are in force. They comprise the Rhine Pact between Germany, Belgium, France, Great Britain and Italy, and arbitration conventions between Germany and Poland and between Germany and Czechoslovakia.
From this date, Germany and Belgium, and Germany and France, mutually undertake never to resort to war, promising to resolve all questions, whatever their nature, through diplomacy.
These agreements will remain in force until one of the powers, wishing otherwise, gives three months’ notice, with the League required to promise sufficient guarantees to the other contracting parties.
With Germany’s cooperation, the League grows in prestige and strength. Germany is not merely a great power, but a great civilization, a great expression of human thought.
Its arrival in Geneva, by bringing the question of permanent seats into debate, opened a serious crisis that is still unresolved. Only when Brazil and Spain return to their places can the problem be considered settled.
Secondary-school pupils complain of an overloaded science programme
Secondary-school pupils complain that their syllabuses stretch on endlessly and that they have no time to get through the work. The fourth class, for example, must study a long science syllabus covering physics, chemistry, zoology, botany, geology and mineralogy. All this must be learned in seven months, with three lessons a week.
What are we waiting for before decreeing a reform of secondary-school syllabuses?
Tram fires on Rua do Mundo prompt an appeal to Carris
On Rua do Mundo, fires break out in electric trams almost every day. Even when there are no other consequences, they at least cause panic among the passengers.
Today there were two incidents, in which a tram brakeman suffered burns to his hands.
We do not know what causes these occurrences and confine ourselves to drawing Carris’s attention to them.
Context
Why League seats mattered to the new European settlement
The League’s Council combined permanent seats for major powers with seats elected by the Assembly. It handled questions including security and disarmament, so a permanent place meant continuing access to decisions central to the European settlement. The Geneva letter connects Germany’s admission with the hopes surrounding Locarno, but also with the competing ambitions of Brazil and Spain. Bringing a major power into the organization could strengthen it while reopening the question of how influence was distributed.
A broad science curriculum met the limits of classroom time
The school column sets an ideal of wide scientific knowledge against the time available to learn it. Physics and chemistry appear alongside the study of animals, plants, rocks and minerals, all within one year’s science programme. The complaint is therefore about the organization of learning: a syllabus could list many branches of knowledge without allowing enough lessons for pupils to master them. The final demand for reform turns students’ everyday workload into a question of educational administration.
Electric transport brought maintenance into daily civic debate
Lisbon’s electric tram service began in 1901, replacing an earlier system of animal traction. By the time of this article, electric cars were part of ordinary urban movement. Repeated fires threatened both passengers’ confidence and employees’ safety, making reliability a public concern as well as an engineering responsibility. Addressing Carris by name, the newspaper used a short local column to direct pressure towards the company running the service.
Original
CARTA DE GENEBRA
CARTA DE GENEBRA
O dia de hoje ficará sendo uma data historica. A entrada da Alemanha na Sociedade das Nações marca o inicio de uma nova orientação da politica europeia.
Estão em vigor os celebres acordos de Locarno, compreendendo o “Pacto rhenano„, entre a Alemanha, a Belgica, a França, a Gran-Bretanha e a Italia; e convenções de arbitragem entre a Alemanha e a Polonia, e a Alemanha e a Tcheco-Slovaquia.
Desde esta data, a Alemanha e a Belgica, a Alemanha e a França comprometem-se reciprocamente a não recorrer á guerra em caso algum, prometendo resolver todas as questões, seja de que naturesa forem, pela via diplomatica.
Estes acordos estarão em vigor, até que uma das potencias, desejando o contrario, formule esse pedido com três meses de antecedencia, sendo necessario que a S. das N. prometa garantias suficientes ás outras partes contratantes.
Com a colaboração da Alemanha, a S. das N. aumento de prestigio e de força. Ela não é sómente uma grande potencia, mas uma grande civilisação, uma grande expressão do pensamento humano.
A sua vinda a Genebra, pondo em discussão o problema dos lugares permanentes, abriu uma grave crise que ainda não está solucionada. Só quando o Brasil e a Espanha voltarem a ocupar os seus lugares é que se poderá considerar o problema resolvido.
Os alunos dos liceus queixam-se
Os alunos dos liceus queixam-se de que os programas são do comprimento da legua da Povoa e que não têm tempo para dar conta do seu recado. A 4.ª classe, por exemplo, é obrigada a estudar um longo programa de Sciencias, que consta de Fisica, Quimica, Zoologia, Botanica, Geologia e Mineralogia. Tudo isto se deve aprender em sete meses, com três aulas por semana.
O que se espera para decretar a remodelação dos programas de instrução secundaria?
Na Rua do Mundo
Na Rua do Mundo, registam-se, quasi todos os dias, incendios nos carros electricos, o que, quando outras consequencias não tenha, provoca, pelo menos, o panico entre os passageiros.
Hoje, durante o dia, registaram-se dois acidentes, tendo ficado queimado nas mãos um guarda-freio.
Não sabemos a que atribuir tais factos, limitando-nos a chamar, para eles, a atenção da Carris.