AROUND THE TEA TABLE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXI, Issue 102, 2 May 1930, Page 11

AROUND THE TEA TABLE.

MATTERS OF GENERAL INTEREST. tßy SHIRLEY.) Does war really feminise eoldiers. I mean, of course, in the best way. We read of the Greek hero who had to bo disguised a≤ a woman once, and liow disgustedly and badly he managed die ■sphidle and distaff —my own idea now V 6 that he quite enjoyed hinselt. e hear so much nowadays ct returned diggers still able to embroider, patch and darn, so that sisters and wives, allegedly, bow their headc in shame. ~So disgrace, however., for perfection always i≤ admirable. An Australian ex-soldier showed taste and also some feminine eubtlety sonie years ago. when lie started to build up a knitting machine industry. He advertised for the necessary machine, and was offered one at a price beyond hk expectations. Thereupon he adroitly inserted an advertisement or two , offering such machine: for less than that price, needless tG not troubling whether he received replies or noc. The knitting machine people evidently eaw the ads., for soon he got offers for a machine on much more reasonable terms. His troubles were not over, however—his one girl employee mismanaged the machine, with the result that his establishment wae overrun by complaining customers. Fate then stepped in, pushing forward an hitherto obdurate uncle, who. seeing euch a congress, deduced that this prosperous business deserved encouragement to the tune of five hundred pounds. There i= no moral to this storv.

■"Love rules the court, the camp, the irrove/' sings one of Scotland's bards,. but. according to some recent ideas, the camp, at least the miner'"; camp, must ; be ruled out. That is to say, in the modern establishment of this nature. The lonely miner ie not weep'rag for the sight of a woman or a child —he does not travel many miles just to see an elderly female in a kitchen. Marie Stopes i≤ the latest to voice this idea, but one woman, who has lived in such camps, states that the lad who told this to that eminent birth controller, was, a* natives say. "pulling of Marie the leg.'' It seems that the modern miners in the outback. so far from weeping over elderly females, view even the appearance of a young and beautiful one with morose suspicion. They are quite convinced that all the troubles of the world are due to these ■'dashed women"' (I modify the adjective a little). They have jaundiced views on our capabilities even as mothers, like the one who blamed the lady n-heii her child's first teeth fell out —"Careless." he said. He considers the lonely child of the camp, in any case, not a goldenhaired darling for whom he work- little curios out of wood, but a confounded nuisance waking him up on Sunday mornings when he wants to go to sleep. His deadly fear is, of course., the new woman arrival in the camp, who invariably wants "to make everything sweet and clean" in his unspeakable shack. The already established woman. v, T ho has gone through this stage and got over it. dare say nothing, because she might be accused of envy. Besides, she rather likes to hear the man roar when he comes back and finds the Airedale put out and ghastly white curtain~ on the cleaned windows, and fiowero —flowers in vases! Besides that, an absolutely clean floor, which a man hates more than clean walls and glass. He can. by hard .-elf-control, endure the last. The new ladies come modestly forward to get their meed of praise, and then it is that the roar begins. The sentimental picture of the man outback wanting a woman's "little touches about his house" dies hard., but. after all, we should realise that the man has mostly gone out there to escape civilisation, and civilisation is woman, and so his escape is from us ae well. Anyway, next time you see a picture of the lonely miner sitting at his ehack door, with a dreamy look in his eyes, do not think he ifi wanting a woman's gentle, civilising touch. He is merely wanting a dog.

The ethically minded have grave doubts of the now talkies, especially those, which begin, almost before the overture has stopped, with a hand coming oat of the darkness and shooting a man who afterwards, for six reels, will be merely the body. For myself. I hold that such speakies introduce some fine old ideals with a vividness that goes far xo atone for their too great concern with alibis, spots on the carpet, and mysterious telephone calls. For instance, the girls of the house where this trouble occurs are never dreadful new women in the least degree—they are always, either as daughters, or adopted daughters, living contentedly at home with the Body (before it became that), not wanting to be lawyers, or aeroplanists, or even ordinary wage earners. They have no ambitions. That is why we can suspect them, because they would be *o completely helpless if money was not willed to them, or if a mysterious hand didn't shoot before that will could be changed. Another dear old touch about the detective lilntie the scarecrow housekeeper, who also might have been the mysterious shooter, because she gets so 'nerrous and excited when the gimleteyed detective does the questioning. Then, in. thie household, the servants have almost invariably been in the Body's service all their lives—this is to make more thrilling the fact that even they can be suspected. A harassed Xew Zealand housewife telle me she wishes she knew where to get such servants. She would risk being mysteriously ahot in the end. but it seems a bad omen all the same—having faithful servants who do not quit.

The "School Journal-"' has revived Little Lord Fauntleroy, which is to the good, but, alae, he ie shorn of his famous long saeh. curls and velvet suit which made the martyrdom of little boys some forty odd years ago who had to be dressed accordingly, -even though their features said plain Bill. Perhaps the compilers of thifi journal feared the cold scorn of certain little lads with bare knees intent on doing- nobler work than soften an aged and aristocratic grandsire. This excellent magazine take? a pot shoe at Shakespeare to circulate right views of life. "He- did several foolish things when young: at eighteen he did another foolish thing. He fell in lave with a woman, Ann Hathaway, but instead of waiting until he was able to support a wife, he married her, and by th etime he was twenty-one, had three children." So Shakespeare, like his own great Caesar, is put to somewhat hard usage, a warning as regards gMftlessness and irresponsibility to young people in a land of which he never heard.