TABLE TALK.

Auckland Star, Volume XVIII, Issue 88, 15 April 1887, Page 1

TABLE TALK.

Glorious weather! <«&■■<+**, Art Exhibition opened. * "r'BSjW^v Oh, I don't care for pictures ; give me reality. -.. You're rather "artless," eh ? '"^vv^i"-* No, but I believe in the adage— Ars cst celare arttm. So you would conceal all art by shoving the pictures out of sight. Why, you must) be a regular Vandal — a "savage" a "Colonus !" Mercy ! Stop ! I hope I'm not so bad as all that. I'm going to see "Betsy" tonight. Worse and worse—to talk thus brazenly about an assignation with a common "slavey." Oh !Go along! Your stupidity would make anybody " savage." " Betsy "is the Comedy at the Opera House. The dancing season has set in early in Auckland. An Episcopal clergyman was asked recently if he thought dancing a sin. " Yes," responded the worthy rector; "yes, a great sin—if you don't dance well!" _ Apropos, I see the Scripture Gift Association are distributing leaflets on the sin of dancing. Ah ! they forget that the Scriptures say there^s " a time to dance." And of course there's no harm in dancing1. : _ But yet an American paper lately found it necessary to say of a local assembly:— "These dances have been kept up on as purely a mor.il basis as practicable." Volunteer troubles still sticking out, "ies; Major Garner wants damages from some newspapers for telling libs about him. Say, rather, for telling the truth before it flowed through the authorised channels. The Defence Minister doesn't intend, after all, to punish qhe rowdy Volunteers at Taranaki. Guess he finds he isn't strong enough. If he inflicted punishment he would have a big "troubrle " on hand at once. Talking of Volunteers, there's a good story told by an Otago paper, as follows :— A Dunedin woman sold her wash-tub to a party of riflemen for a target. They paid her for it, and after they had gone home she went out into the field and brought it back' as good as ever again. Very good. These marksmen made " butts " of themselves ! AVater-butts or rifle-butts ? Whichever you like; but any way it's plain they were not using Auckland ammunition. A caution to bakers these hard times. What's that ? In a debt case before the Court at Paeroa the other day, the Resident Magistrate, much to his astonishment, informed the plaintiff that he was liable to a fine of £2 for every "loaf" mentioned |in the bill of ])articulars, as he should have sued for "lbs. of bread." Ah ! I see what yon mean. All our Auckland bakers make out their accounts for so many loaves. Yes ; and they thus offer a very strong temptation to the poorer classes to repudiate their debts. Oh, poor but honest folks would never dream of robbing the man of dough. But they might think it fair retaliation. Are you aware that you can buy flour by the 501b bag at less than ljd per lb, and yet have to pay 2d per lb to the baker after he has added an equal weight of water to it ? Didn't look at it in that light. I guess the only safe thing for the bakers to do is to get new billheads at once. Mr D. A. Tole has reported on the Herekino special settlers. Says they are all happy and thriving, but complain of having to " hump " their " tucker " over 13 miles of mountain precipices. Perhaps Hobbs was right after all about the danger of starvation ; for it appears that after performing that journey the settler sometimes finds that the storekeeper's supplies are exhausted. In that case the settler would have all the less to carry. Some folks are never contented ! ,