THE PASSING SHOW.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 25, 31 January 1928, Page 6

THE PASSING SHOW.

(By THE MAN ABOUT TOWN.) It unluckily happens that at rare intervals nn inebriated citizen may find his -nay into a bus. Such a rara avis lately hung from his strap, swaying darigerousBROTHERS. ly, addressing the crowd on world affairs, and adding to the discomfort of the passengers. There was a young clergyman abroad who politely rose, offering liis seat to the inebriate, who instantly subsided into it, the cleric taking his strap. The parson leaned over his newfriend and engaged him in chatty conversation. The grateful drunk, in a very loud voice, said, "You're the only gent in the bus. You know what it is to get tight, I'll bet a dollar." Haig of Bemersyde, the great field-marshal, will never die in the memory of the men he commanded or in the story of the Empire he lived for. He loved AVE ATQUE VALE, the men who made his high command possible, and they loved him because he fought an even greater fight for them in peace than ever he did in war. It is a little satisfaction to have something this man had held in his masterful hand. In a letter to M.A.T., Earl Haig (who as a staff officer was the first man to give orders to the first Xew Zealand troops in South Africa) was typically selfless and typically appreciative of the man in the ranks. Writing of New Zealand Mounted Rifles, he says in this letter, "Such splendid men and splendid horses —but although the horses were rested and looked after for five or six weeks after landing the short forage ration and long waterless treks soon told and the numbers gradually diminished. How very sad to be unable to prevent such wastage in horseflesh. With kindest remembrances to all old friends." The Rotorua express was delayed a few seconds while Dad and Mum clung to the lips of the school-teaching emigre, and important headmasters in embrvo AN AROMA OF gave Auckland one last CHALK. lingering glimpse of them until Easter. The train and other trains during the day were stiff with returning teachers, diluted here and there with children who will soon again be immured in boiling schoolrooms under torrid tin roofs. M.A.T. endeavoured to mentally separate the school teachers from the less gifted public on the platform, but found that in appearand; teachers are almost human, and cannot be distinguished from the average person except by the voice, which, of course, has been trained to reach the naughtiest infant in the back row. Here and there is the chatter of shop, and here and there, too, the drip of tears, for some of these girls are leaving comfy homes within sound of the Harbour Board dredges for remote townships where only the tune°of the tui is heard. It occurred to M.A.T. as he observed so many of these undeniably bright young people that it is by their hands that the plastic material for future Prime Ministers will be moulded.

"J.H." writes: This year being election year (for which party will it be leap year?) our politicians might do worse than study Big Bill Thom ps on. An A PARTY BILL. American writer has said

of him that he knows very little about municipal politics, but everything about getting elected. He has been on both sides of every municipal question—that \\ on t be a hard lesson for some of our political aspirants—and sometimes on both skies of one question at the same time. . His anti-British outburst was merely an electioneering stunt to make sure of the German vote; he indulged in similar publicity stunts to get the Slav vote, the negro vote, the prohibition ■\oto and the anti-Y olstead vote. As soon as he is elected he starts in to prepare for the next election. He promises the electors everything and his earlier promises and their nonfulfilment are forgotten in the glee with which his later ones are hailed. He is electioneering every day and knows more slogans than the Reform party. When other things failed he started on a voyage to South America to catch and take moving pictures of the tree-climbino-fish, he tnnelled through the inland waterways of the States, but by the time he had reached the coast the publicity value of the expedition had ceased, so he returned to Chicago. Yes our politicians might well study Big Bill Thompson. And yet, on the other hand, do tliev need to 2

Touching tho anniversary of the V.C. Famous old regiments, unlike splendid new icgiments, have hoary histories, and it is the

custom for oflicers to be THIN RED LINE, turned on to tell their

histories and to make the lookie proud of his clotli. For instance, the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders are "a'v.C. regiment, and the only one in the army to display Balaclava 011 their colours. Thev were, as every schoolboy knows, "the Thin Red Line," and on their Glengarry bonnets there is a diced band and the recruit is early taught to understand that he wears the V.C. on his cap Bisecting the diced band is a thin red line, and if the recruit doesn't get the thin red' line in his "issue ' bonnet he goes and buys a pukka one out of his thin red pay. Queen Victoria intimated to Colin Campbell, of gallant and imperishable memory, that he was to have the \.(A, but Campbell intimated to Her Majesty that lie would receive the supreme decoration only if every survivor of his regiment was awarded one, too. It may be a coincidence or not, but from that time to the Great War 110 V .C. was awarded to any officer, non-com. or man in the famous old corps, although its record since the Crimea is as tine as the record of any regiment in the service. It was impossible to avoid giving this regiment of the Laches From Hell V.C.'s in the great war, and anyway there it is 011 the bonnet surviving the Victorian era, and imperishable in the lieaits of thoso who love gallant soldiers.

„ Jhe following true story is printed with the full privity and concurrence of the Auckland citizen concerned and of his wife. The AW ttvpat * husband thinks it may AN IDEAL stand as a fingerpost to HUSBAND, other husbands on the ( - 4 rr,, .. highway of domestic felicity. The wife left home for a holiday. Most men at such a time relapse into barbarism, leave the sink full of used crockery sleep on top of the bed, forget to put the cat' and the billy out, and so forth. But Herbert (is his name Herbert?) determined to surprise his wife by doing every chore properly. He would have the house precisely as she had left it so that when she came back she would regard linn as the Prize Husband. So when she returned and entered the kitchen where the glassware shone like bubbles the sink was gleaming white with sandsoap and elbow grease, the shelves in order, blowflies absentia short, perfection. The wife looked round and sighed, saying little. He had had trouble about making the bed, but had succeeded in producing a relatively perfect job. Everything in the room was in order. Even the crimson and gold announcement "God Bless Our Home" was dressed by the right. The wife collapsed in a chair and sobbed bitterly. Herbert (who is a most devoted man) was frightfully upset Why. my dear, whatever is the matter'" "Oh, B-b-b-b-Bert,"' ,he sobbed, "vo,, "T™ were going to bach while I was away. I understand you having your meals away from home, but fancy not s-s-sleeping in VO ur own bed!" Herbert untruthfully 1 remark! 5 took two pairs of silk stockings and a week's ! a J,°, ex P lam aw;, y the circumstance but M.A.T. has the best reason for knowing that those young people were laughing heartiW minutes after the wife got bac£ *