THE PASSING SHOW.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 304, 24 December 1929, Page 6

THE PASSING SHOW.

(By THE MAN ABOUT TOWN.) MERRY CHRISTMAS. May we meet with happy cheer, Each and every one. Rally from afar and near Round the table of the rear. Youth and age m harness run. Cap the season with a feast, Kail the holly with a song, Raise the glass In pledge together, Sing of rose and sing of heather, Toast the l'ule along. Merrv let us gladly be, . And over cracker, nuts and wine Sing the song of Auld Lang Syne. Willing exiles in this far, far sunnier land, as they threw another shovtlful of coal on the fire and huddled round it last night, needed only the driving sleet out G-G-G-GOOD DAY! o' window to bring back to memory days of long ago. This morning the dwellers in a subtropical climate gazed at that sunny blossom the pohotukawa, sorted out their heaviest overcoats, blew their blue noses and thought of skates, skis, slides and curling. Many cheery souls with chattering teeth said, "A M-m-m----mer-er-y C-c-c-clirie'mas!" and burst into sunny smiles. An old seadog, gazing through the fast-shut window of a ferry boat, said, "I-I—uh—t-think -it's-going-to-be-f-f-fine!" and beat his hands against his woolly overcoat and gave a splendid imitation of gladness. Fuis were not uncommon, giving a touch of midsummer to the scene. Feminine legs in the lightest of silk seemed incongruous at the south end of an all-embracing bunny ' seal.' Groups of rugged sailormen, many 01 whom have sailed Cape Horn in a blizzard and accompanied people like Scott, Shacklcton and Bvrd, shivered at corners and patiently waited for the opening of cheerful palaces of midsummer mirth. One almost imagined that the active and intelligent street sweeper, handling his broom as to the manner born, swept up drifting snow. Strawberries shuddered in the windows. Notices conveying the glad tidings of "Teat joy, "Ices Here!" blushed as the shuddering crowd drifted past with a\ert?d heads and coat collars turned up. Already, as M.A.T. taps the frigid keys, there is_ enough blue m the sky to make a sailor a pair o brocks. -As the skipper said this morning, "'I uh t-think it's going to be f-f-f-fine for C-c-c-c'nstmas. He ought to know!

This is the joyful time of year when everybody loves good cheer. Two bonny little air Is in perfect health have arrived from Palmerston North to visit THE SLEEPERS. Auckland relatives for the Christmas holidays. Uncle naturally wished to know what sort of time they had had on the trip. The elder answered for them both. "Oh, Uncle, we were asleep all the way." Then the lady who accompanied them from Palmerston North suggested that they may have opened their eyes once or twice on the journey. Between them they consumed twenty-nine sandwiches, apples, six oranges and four pieces of chewing gum. The local headmaster had assembled hisschool for a few valedictory remarks prior to dismissing the perfectly willing scholars for six weeks. Ho spoke of RECIPROCITY, the year that is passing, of the successes and the pleasures. "I hope," said he, "that you will all have a very pleasant holiday." The school applauded. Then he went on. "And I also hope you will do better next year than you have done this year." And with one united voice the school roared, "The same to you, sir!" Betty, is eight. She came over the road to play with a neighbour's little <*irl. Minnie is nine. Minnie's mother said to Betty, Well, Betty, dear, what is old MATURITY. Father Christmas going to bring for you?" "I don't know," said Betty, "but I'm going to liang my stocking up." Nine-year-old Minnie said nothing until Betty had trotted home. Then she said to her mother, "I thought I'd better not tell the'little kid there isn't any Father Christmas."

As you are nursing your post-pudding indigestion to-morrow very likely you will conjure up thoughts of other puddings, real r and fictitious. Very likeTHE PUDDING, ly you don't remember the Craeliits' pudding word for word? It's a world-famous pudding. Mrs. Crachit left the room .alone, too nervous to bear witnesses, to take up the pudding and bring it in. Suppose it should not be done enough? Suppose somebody should have got over "the wall and stolen it, a supposition at which the two young Crachits became livid. Hallo! A great deal of steam. A smell like a washing day. That was the cloth. A smell like an eating'house-and a pastrycook's next door to each other, with a laundress' next door to that! In half a minute Mrs. Crachit entered—flushed but smiling proudly, with the pudding like a speckled cannon ball, so hard and firm,, blazing in half of a half-quartern of ignited brandy and bedight with Christmas holly stuck in" the top. Bob Crachit said, and calmly, too, that he regarded it as the greatest success achieved by Mrs. Crachit since their marriage. Everybody had something to say about it, but nobody said or thought it was at all a small pudding for a large family. It would have been flat heresy. Then, too, there was the hot something in a jug and the family display of glass—two tumblers and a custard cup without a handle. Bob saved it with beaming looks and then proposed "A merry Christmas to us all, my dears. God bless us!" Which all the family re-echoed. "God bless us every one!" said Tiny Tim, the last of all. Dear M.A.T., —My children have been taught to stand with hats off when a funeral passes. One day last week a gala was held to raise funds for the HATS OFF ! Hamilton East School dental clinic. When all was over the band in attendance played the usual. Mother said, "Bob, take your hat off while the band plays 'God Save the King.'" Bob, aged five, replied, "Why, there's nobody dead." —C.E.W. We grow more sentimental as Ave ? grow older. If we are far away when Christmas is coming, our feet turn home again if we have the cash to grease the SENTIMENT. ways. Said a man to

M.A.T. this morning: "I thought I'd like to have my Christmas dinner in New Zealand this year. It doesn't taste the same abroad. I haven't been home for nineteen years." Xot that M.A.T. would ever believe that mere tucker will draw a man across the world. A fellow wouldn't conic- from Borneo to Ivamschatska to sit at a table d'hote and watch strangers gobble hot food. Think how clever people have commercialised sentiment. You get tinned plum pudding (holly and all) in Sumatra. Canned turkey done to the turn is available in scorching Allahabad. Mince pies bom in London have been opened by lone shunters in the snowy Nor'-West of Canada. Armed with a few canned product; of modern industry, a few family photos, a

little sentiment, and a tin opener. Sumatra at Christmas time may seem like Sandringham (nee Edendale) and like Remuera.