THE PASSING SHOW.

Auckland Star, Volume LVIII, Issue 25, 31 January 1927, Page 6

THE PASSING SHOW.

(By THE MAN ABOUT TOWN.) I ! ! The Wellington tram cars are to be upholstered in mouuette. and the seats kept as '"clean as a j clean housewife's Chesterfield," with the aid of vacuum cleaners. "Oldj AND WHY NOT? timer" snorts indignantly: I '"Nice pampering: Fifty } ears ago I used to walk twenty I miles into Auckland, and was mightv glad jto get a lift part of the way in a 'bullock ; dray. The only upholstered seat them davs was j the seat of a man's pants—double thickness at I the back, I'm telling you. A pair of dungarees ■ cost seven and a bender those times, and if thev I wore out under five years we reckoned we'd been i 'had.' Upholstered seats, heh? They'll be get- | ting cushions and morning tea served out° to I navvies next: Surely were not as soft as to | need such things in Auckland!" I

J Yes: bus drivers have their uses, apart from j driving buses. For instance, there was the driver jof the last bus from Takapuna the other night. He had counted his cash at : THEY HAVE the other end and bagged it. i THEIR USES. to hand over on his return to ! the depot. Gaily he sang as | he drove his jigger gaily towards home and rest. 1 driving her at a pace which may possibly have i exceeded the speed limit by a furlong an hour. | Suddenly his lights picked up a figure which had ! run out on to the road, frenziedly capering and J gesticulating. On went the brakes, and up pulled ! the fast speeding bus. "A late bird," soliloquised the r driver preparing to embark a last loneliest and love- ! | liest ''fare." But the figure made no attempt ! Ito pass beyond the footboard. It held out a j | florin to the driver. "Can you give me two j | separate shillings for this?" it "asked. "The gas , has run out, and I haven't a shilling for the ! slot." " ; i ! A little girl was rescued from drowning off i a South Taranaki beach the other dav bv an j angler, who threw his line out to her. At the , first throw the girl was FISHERS OF MEN. struck on the head bv the sinker. At the second she was hooked. Angling is thus lent a new zest, j have heard much of giant mako sharks | and swordlish being caught recently that Zane j (irey has become a nightmare. A haul of j humanity sounds really refreshing. Since so [ many people cannot swim, we could strengthen j the life-saving clubs on our beaches with non- | swimmers, equipping them with fishing lines. If i they can t catch sharks, they would find plentv I to do hooking human beings who get out of their | depths. It ought to be far better sport than swordfishing. The yell of a freshly-hooked 16- , stoner would give a fine thrill to the angler, and |a certain amount of "play," just s.'aort of drown-j j ing the catch, would, of course, be permissible. !

j _ It appears that the three.watchmen who were] j left to guard the wrecked steamer Cooma from l pirates and the like on North Reef, coast of i Queensland, weren't watch- J WHILE ing, for they had to be called ' j THE WATCHMAN with much vigour bv the . ' SLEPT. local lighthouse keeper while | the ship was blazing merrily. l I Reprehensible to sleep while on watch—but MAT j , has done it himself. On one occasion, when a j ! boy aboard a little barque which was moored in: j the \ arra, he was night watchman. (Thev made ' . the ship s boys night watchmen betause thev J 1 couldn't do as much work lugginc cargo ! the day as grown sailormen.) "While he wal 1 I having his sleep, some of the fo'c'sie hands I | got down into the hold and had a rare old go ;at a rum cask—4o overproof! What they' ; couldn't swallow for immediate consumption they j | brougnt on deck in pickle bottles. first thing i the boy knew (he was slumbering happily near j the galley fire) was that boards of partiI tion separating galley from fo'c'sie came smashj i n g down. Boy awoke just in time to see rumI mad sailor come bursting through with tomai hawk. Boy was first up the main ringing—won I easily. Sailor got tangled. Roared like i ; demented dingo. Skipper came on deck with I gun. Police, trial for broaching cargo, gaol for ; rum-bibbers, rope's-tua for boy who went to j sleep. Rum go! I Judging by the gay chatter of the numerous : Chinese who were making their way to the i Takat>una racecourse this morning to pick the winners they are allesredlv! IP WE INTERN infallible at picking, the war THE in China is one of the things' CHINESE. that concern them least. But' their bland and happv smiles 1 may turn to looks of dismay if the British Lion ■ | goes rampaging in China in warlike earnest. We ■ | may have to intern them. Think of the danger j j of letting various Chinks loose to wander around ! with pumpkins filled with high explosives to blow i jup the modern fortifications which we don't j | possess. It can tbe done. A telegram from the j ["Star's" Wellington correspondent to-day savs j .that •" T.D.H. " (evidently "Too D d'Hot'") directs attention to Dr. Bumpus, who asks us! | to direct attention to the perilous situation which ' I will arise in this Dominion if Britain drifts into j war with China. Under the War Regulations all j enemy aliens will have to be interned, and this j will mean that about 3500 Chinese will have to jbe cooped up at Somes Island, which has a total I area of 67 acres, 2 roods, 24 perches. After carej ful calculation, it has been found that this area | is quite insufficient to grow the usual supply of i greengroceries, even with fifty Chinks cultivating j each acre—and it is well known that a really i good Chink can grow a cabbage to the inch 1 and a bag of potatoes to the foot. There will ■ I thus be precipitated a dietetic crisis, in which I the health of New Zealanders, whose diet is one- i twentieth New Zealand lamb, one-twentieth | | schnapper or disguised shark, and eighteen-twen- j I tieths vegetables, will suffer severely. Surely > J it would be better that we let the Chinese have Shanghai than that we should suffer the loss of jour greens. Besides, with Nationalists and non- ' I Nationalists cooped up together on Somes Island, 1 there wouldn't be a Chinaman alive to grow our j vegetables after the war—supposing we managed jto survive their absence until peace returned. C j j In politics it all depends upon circum- ; I stances, and upon the strength or weakness of' | your party, how you fare if you dare form an opinion of your own and act : THE POLiTICAL on it. Take the case of Mr. ' WAY. Gillies, of the New South, W ales Assembly. When the ' deputy-leader of the Labour Government, Mr. L-oughlin, had a difference with the Premier Mr. i Lang, and tried to wreck the Government, Mr. ■ ' Gillies lent him willing assistance. For that he ' ; was ejected from Caucus. The plot failing, Mr. ] : Gillies saw the error of his way, confessed it, and ! ! was readmitted to the bosom of his party. Had I r : le . r ,art . v had „* stron g majority over the Oppo- ; s'tion, Mr. Gillies would have remained in the | eyes oi that party a renegade, traitor, twister, • 1 snake in the grass, and other of the things which i ' --e had been called at tne time of his defection. | i But tae part\ being perilously weak in numbers. ■ ' he was washed whiter than the lamb and welj corned back to the fold. Take, also, a case nearer i : home—that of Mr. Allan Bell. M.P., Independent . Liberal in the Coates Government. Mr. Beil ' made a few irritating criticisms. "You're not the I only pebble on the beach," said the Prime Minis- '

i ter. "1 111 the pebble that keeps tout partv in ' | power," returned Mr. Bell. And "he was. " Mr. ■ Coates did no: tell him to go to, that he could do I without him. Mr. Coates' party did not have | sufficient strength to survive a combined chal- ; lenge from the Opposition and the Labour party j without Mr. Bell. After the elections i when Mr I Bell had been cajoled into the Reform ranks i" I Mr. Harris, member for Waitemata. dared to : . criticise the (.overnment. But Mr. Harris was : only one out of a number of pebbles for the ; Government had come back with a thumpinoj majority —and Mr. Harris was to'd he could "o ! to —anywhere he liked, that the Government ■ ' could do without him. If Mr. Harris had offered ' his criticism hefore the elections, he * have been caned—he would have been giwm a nice I piece of barley sugar. " J