THE PASSING SHOW.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 173, 24 July 1928, Page 6

THE PASSING SHOW.

(By THE MAN ABOUT TOWN.) BEST SIDE TO LONDON. A southern dealer has been fined for selling potatoes, the largest of which were in the top of the sack, and the smallest in the bottom. "I see by the papers," said Bill to his mate, "As a bloke 'as bin fined in the South For putting small spuds in the foot o* the sack And the big 'uns on top; in the mouth. "But I don't read as M.P.'s wot promises free Is Kaoled when they skite like the doose 'Cos they fails to perform what they promises, see, With election time as their excuse. "I never knew publicans anger the beak By chargin' for froth on their beer. Or a tradesman do time for sellin' you glass When you're payin' for tucker so dear. "Did you ever hear shopmen tell customers: 'This cloth is undoubtedly rotten, We sell it as wool and the price is wool price. But the stuff is of course made of cotton.' "Or butchers as told you, 'This meat has bin froze, Though 1 charge you the same as for fresh. Ton can take it or leave it, I don't give a cuss, For all meat is certainly flesh.' "It ain't only greengrocers hocusses us. An' puts all the big 'uns a-top. You'd do it yerself if you 'ad 'alf a chance, But you don't, 'cos you're scared o' the cop!" A long, uninterrupted perusal of British and American pot-boiling magazine ehort stories convinces the peruser that American writers frequently see or LIGHT experience what they deLITERATURE. scribe. Also that a majority of British scribblers go no further than Fleet Street for bloodthirsty colonial adventure. Here at random is a yarn of a New Zealand "ranch," illustrated with bewhiskered villains wearing wicked clothes and armed with rifles and revolvers. Here, again, is a Gippsland story of bushrangers in which a sainted young swell with £5000 buys a "big clearing location" (five hundred acres!). The Australian bushrangers "guess," "calkilate" and are otherwise honest-to-good-ness cowpunchers; the people "trek" and come across the "spoor" of men and animals. A tiger or a meercat roaming the bush is permitted. In a colonial yarn by a man with a name, the heroic new chum defends himself in his "cabin" among the kauris of Otagc against the furious boomerang attacks of cannibal Maoris who hold a "corroboree" with the heroine tied to the adjacent scenery. One suggests that many English magazine story writers immure themselves at Stoke Pogis with a mixed dictionary of American, Australian, South African and Xew Zealand local slang or current phrases and earn good money. The bloodthirst alleged to exist in the Dominions by British magazine writers is possibly the reason why innocent immigrants who will risk their precious lives among the fierce Jersey cows and the dangerous Romneys all have revolvers in their little portmanteaux. One of the constant puzzles to the newly-arrived immigrant is that he can walk from the Queen's wharf to Grey Avenue without firing a single shot at a "bandit," a "bad man," a "yegg," a "hobo," a "bywoner," a "gunman" or any other lethal person spread so persistently through English magazines. The other extreme of improbability is the never-ending spate of drivel in which the 'Varsity man turns chauffeur and captures the young affections of a perfectly useless but lovely young employer. And the one shocking lack in thousands of columns of magazine potboilers is a story with wit, humour or laughter. Here in one well-known magazine a doctor punches a patient senseless, there is a long dreary yarn about gravestones, the slow poisoning of a wife by a doctor, a suicide, the blinding of a jockey by acid, a massacre in Rhodesia and a murder by drowning. But from end to end not the faintest suspicion of a smile or even a chuckle. The writers possibly learn their business from gunmen who run correspondence schools.

The lamented passing of the supreme English actress, Ellen Terry, will remind many people that in her advancing age she came to New Zealand hoping to THE CURTAIN, find enough people who had heard of Shakespeare to justify her reading him to them. The great actress had previously been worshipped by huge audiences in America, and it may have surprised her to find that she stirred no enthusiasm of any kind either in Australia or New Zealand. All does not end with the fall of the curtain For still do we turn to you Gratefully, gladly, Tenderly, sadly, Thanking you fondly with voices uncertain, Drunk with the joys you have shimmered before us. The magical charm that your art has thrown o'er us. We who have been in the spell of your power Hour by sweet hour. With tears that sped laughing. And smiles that broke Eobbing, Hearts once so sluggish now quickened and throbbing. WC iD you gladness ar * gratefully thanking In medieval days the inkspiller with a facetious turn of expression had to watch his step and more carefully his head, for if he transgressed the canons of ON WITH solemnity in dealing with THE DANCE! crowned heads, princelings and what not the headsman called round and people paid high prices to see him make his last bow. Our own Prince Charming has not demanded the head of the revue flaneur who in "Many Happy Returns" has written: I<v p danced with a man who's Hanced with a cirl \\hos danced with the Prince of Wales--1 n ' Iraz1 raz - r with excitement—completely off the rails When he told me what she told him. The Prince remarked to her, It was simply grand! He said, "Topping band." And she said, "Delightful, Sir." Glory, glory. Hallelujah. I'm the luckiest of females. For I ve danced with a man who's danced with a girl Who's danced with the Prince of Wales. The PrinceJ asked if he minded, said: "Not at all—carry on, ha! ha!" Dear M.A.T., —What do you think? "I see," said I weightily, "the sports consider that if Heeney eats plenty of that New Zealand lamb he is bound to FIGHTING SPIRIT.win." "Lamb!" cried Pamela, uptilting her nose. "What's the good of lamb? Why ever didn't they send him pork?" "Whatever for?" said I (completely nonplussed this time I assure you, M.A.T.). "Wild boar! Fighting spirit!" was the laconic answer. And there's something in that, you may depend upon it. "As a man eateth so is he."—Tuahine. CHAOTICS. Solution for "J.W.A.'s" effort: Ripecistim Empiricist. Here is "M.R.K.'s" contribution to the «aiet v of nations: Bluerpanic. THOUGHTS FOR TO-DAY. Do the duty that lies nearest thee, which thou knowest to be a duty! The second duty will already become clearer.—Carlyle. • • • It fortifies my soul to know That, though I perish. Truth is bo : That, howsoe'er I stray and range, Whate'er I do. Thou dost not change I steadier step when I recall That, if I slip. Thou dost not fall. —Akthcr Hugh Cloegh.