Some Parties I Have Known.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXIX, Issue 306, 23 December 1908, Page 5 (Supplement)

Some Parties I Have Known.

(All Rights Reserved.)

BY A PERSON OF EXPERIENCE.

("Written and illustrated by Hflda Cowham.)

I remember it 6O well, 'cos we weren't having Christmas at home; they were holding a party for us next door. Susie took my photo in the morning, just after 'Santa Claus had been. I sat there with all my toys around mc, looking like a saint, and a pair of new slippers on that I was very proud of; but she stood too close, or something, 'cos she only got my head, and all the rest of mc, including my slippers and toys, were wasted.

~~ ——— I Then it was time to go in next door, I was just four when I put on my they all laughed, and mother said I was | and we did have a jolly time of it. We £rst suit and got into a cab, and was very vulgar, and should be sent away really forgot it was Christmas Day, and ■whirled off to make my debut in the to school directly the holidays were over, all went into the bathroom and turned it world at my first party. I, of course, felt very proud of having into "seasides," and paddled, by turning I remember Susie (that's my young taken a rise out of father, and felt my- on all the taps. Then we put the baby sister) and I had spent the day being' self quite a wit when I said to Dora up the chimney, to see ifi it could see as good as it was possible to be, before j Smith, later on in the evening, at supper- Santa Claus, which made their nurse very going to a party. I'd cut some hair off table: "Miss Dora, do let mc press a eross —it was their baby, not ours —and Susie's head (I'm afraid it spoilt her little jelly on you." She was most in- I put a box of crackers on the fire, appearance that evening), and had stuck | dignant, and called mc an "impudent We went home early, or, rather, we were sent The very horridest, horridest party I ever went to was the one at which I

was the only man. Now you'd think, after all I've told you about myself, that I was "'no end of a dog with the ladies." Wait till you're the only man at a party, and see if you're courage doesn't fail you.

To see them all buzz around eating little hot buns, squeaking and giggling, and you, the man, being told to sit or kneel—l forget precisely which —at the door, and to mew to keep the mice away, just because you'd ventured to say that you'd like to' be the baby that was to be taken and kissed all round. Ugh! I can't bear to think of it; besides, the greedy thing ate all the nice things. I was last, so of course there was nothing left. That's enough about that, eh? Another affair that was not very pleasant was a fancy dress ball that I was invited to. I'd lost the invitation card, and had forgotten the date, and—well, you can guess the rest. It's no joke appearing at any house dressed as a "Red Indian," especially a week after the event.

it on to grandpa's head with pa's glue, i ■while he was asleep, 'cos the poor man 1 hadn't got a single bit, a very brave < and charitable act I call it; but "they," meaning my parents and the governess : and nurse, didn't choose to think so. I 1 •won't tell you what happened, 'cos it's '. not good for one to dwell on the dark ] eide of things. j When we got to the place where the' party was we had tea and things. I : spilt half of mine down my new suit, ibut as I'd had enough it didn't matter. And when we'd finished and "got down," |

poung cub." She was sitting there with ier mouth open, an empty plate in front Df her, and looked hungry. It was great fun, especially when Dolly rushed into grandpa, who is nearly a hundred, and told him he must come and have his fortune told. He wasn't best pleased, as you can tell by the picture. Jack Sprat, that's a chap at our school —his name's not really that, it's only a nick-name —was just going the round of the room admiring the pictures, when he arrievd at the sideboard, and stopped and asked if we weren't going to eat all those things up. A chap ought not to do that sort of thing with a face like his. I sat out a few dances with my partners. One of them was so funny that she made mc split my sides with laughter, but I didn't feel at all pleased when she told ine to run away and get a stitch in them. I don't like that sort of thing; it's a bit too smart for mc. I've been trying ever since to get something to retort to her. Can -ny of you help mc? Accidents happen even at parties sometimes. This time I was going to Molly's birthday tuck. Uncle Sam was taking mc, and he's very near-sighted and can't see more than a yard in front of him. Just as the train was expected that was to carry us both off to the feast a wretched set of trucks came along full of pigs and other wildfowl and stopped at the station. Away flew Uncle Sam, shouting as he! ran towards it: "Come onj Jack, here's the train." "Yours, uncle, not mine," I replied, quite coolly and very cleverly. Then came the awful storm. The guard explained to my near-sighted uncle that it was a "goods train," and full of the aforesaid beasts. Uncle was so mad. I've never seen a man look madder, and, unfortunately for my yarn, he turned round and took mc straight home, so I never went to that party, and, of course, cannot tell you anything about it. I was not happy for the first halfhour after 1 got home. That's uncle's way of teaching mc a lesson not to be rude to my elders — "betters," he said; but I don't agree with him. Christmas comes but once a year, and I shall never forget the Christmas Day that the twins arrived. I told nurse directly she showed them to mc that I could lick 'em both with one band, when I could get a word in edgewise. You never heard such a noise as they made in your life.

"I didn't think it was in you, Master Jack, to eat all the cake!" "It isn't ALL in mc; some's in Molly." Molly, that's a girl that was there, and that" I like, spied round and found a great "normous cake, which we ate, she and I. We were found out, of course, and when their nurse said to mc, '"I didn't think it was in you, Master Jack, to eat all that cake!" I jolly soon let her know it wasn't all in me—that some was in Molly. When" I was tired of blind man's buff, and musical chairs, and all that sort of thing, I found my way upstairs, and put some hair-wash that was in a bottle on one of the dressing-tables on my head. I like hairwash when it is hairwash; but unfortunately this was gum, and I couldn't get my hat off when I got home that night. That's all I remember of my first party, except that I cried when they came to take mc home, and that Susie had yelled. I told mother about her. It was 'cos when they played at charades they'd turned her into a mouse. The second was my own, when I was a bit older and knew my way about better. Father, who is very proud of mc, and thinks mc very clever really, but doesn't often express it in the way I should like, ■wanted to show mc off to some ladies who were there, and he asked mc this silly question: "Why, Jacky, does a hen lay an egg?" " 'Cos she can't lay a carpet," says I. Father was cross 'cos

I remember an "At-Home" I was invited to once. It was a farewell affair for a chap who was going out to China the next day.

"Ive put your seat next to mine, Mies Blenkinsop; I hope you don't mind." "Oh, dear, no, Mr. Tompkins; you know how little it takes to satisfy mc." , Now, Billy Browne's big sister was there; she's married, and uad brought her kid—a thing about six months old. When the cliap got up to say goodbye, up comes Billy Browne's big sister with the baby—it's a girl, by the way. "Now, darling, kiss the great big man!" He starts back and stammers: "N—n—■ no; I'll let her do that when I come back." "And when will that be?" said Billy Browne's big sister. "In sixteen years." Hurrah! That was good, wasn't it? I'm grown up now (eight last birthday) —think of it! —and kids' parties are

quite out of mv line. I like something match—beats any party with best suit much less frivolous. The very last show and such rot hollow. I told Susie so, of the sort that I patronised was a the last time I went home for the long musical "At-Home," and I, being a very vac.; but she didn't see it. Girls are like polite man, went up to a late comer — that. Imagine having your hair done up a lady —and with a winning smile said in lumps of rag all the night before— to her: "Tve put your seat next to mine, would give a man the hump to eleej) in Mis 3 Blenkinsop. I hope you don't them; but there, they have no brains, mind?" "Oh, dear, no!" she said. "You so it doesn't hurt them, know how little it takes to satisfy mc, Good-bye! See you again, perhaps, don't you!" Wasn't it rude? next year.

Well, give mc a real good Rugger