July 8 1924
H M Abrahams (Great Britain) scored a signal triumph in the Olympic Games yesterday, winning the final of the 100 metres against strong American opposition in the magnificent time of 10.35 secs.
The start was a perfect one. It took place in unbroken silence. There was a roar of wild cheering throughout the race. The men all got away in a body, but inch by inch Abrahams forged ahead, and seemed to gain half an inch at each stride from the half-way mark.
It was a beautifully run race throughout, and the finish was greeted with indescribable enthusiasm. The cheering lasted some minutes – a truly international tribute. According to the custom, the national anthem of the conquering nation was played and the flag hoisted.
Harold Abrahams’s 100 metres victory in the 1924 Paris Olympics, as well as Eric Liddell’s 400 metres win, is celebrated in the 1981 Academy Award Best Picture winner Chariots of Fire.
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The Land Bill
The Northern Ireland Land Bill provides adequately for the safeguarding of the Treasury. In every other respect, unless perhaps that of the lucky landlord who can succeed in inducing his tenants to agree to the terms in the Percy Report, it is a lame and impotent northern sequel to the Wyndham Act, upon which it is based.
The pledge to redeem the unbought tenants of the Six Counties has been “redeemed” to the extent of providing the machinery by means of which they can, if they please, purchase their holdings on terms which would have been laughed at twenty years ago.
They are perfectly at liberty to accept or reject the proposal. Like the Act of 1903, the Bill is perfectly voluntary. Neither landlord nor tenant need make use of it if the two are unable to arrive at mutually satisfactory terms.
It was because the bulk of the farmers and landlords of Ireland saw in the Act of 1903 a genuine and businesslike attempt to provide ways and means that they were able to come to satisfactory arrangements and make the Act the success it was.
