THE PASSING SHOW.

Auckland Star, Volume LXI, Issue 162, 11 July 1930, Page 6

THE PASSING SHOW.

(By THE MAN ABOUT TOWN.)

Grandfather had gone to bed. The rest of a numerous family were sitting round the glowing tea-tree toasting their toes and read- ° ° ing improving literature THE BURGLAR, (including this column). There came a loud bump. One of the household said it sounded as if a bui-lar had pushed the piano over. AH sprang to their feet, and the youngest seized the poker. The drawing room was exploled. The piano hadn't stirred and the five-fingei exerckes were still on the music stand. Ihe party entered grandfather's bedroom. He: had fallen out of bed. The teller of the incident doesn't explain why grandfather sounded like a falling piano. Anyhow, lie's quite well. Made one think of the numerous instances in which vounsj children roll out of bed, bumping the floor loudly, parents and others rushing to the rescue, to find the little cherub peacefully sleeping on the floor. There was a baby one knew who used to climb over the top rail of the cot (presumably fast asleep), falling on the floor to continue its slumbers. There is the often-experienced nightmare in which the sleeper thinks he is falling into unfathomable depths. It is usually mentioned m telling the yam of such a nightmare that if the sleeper thinks he bumps the bottom he dies As a dead dreamer has never by any chance told the world that he bumped/ you may take the superstition with the customary grain of salt.

A Home trade paper petulantly wants to know why some great soft goods retailers still insist that their women assistants dress in sombre black when their ALL BLACK. splendid palaces are a riot of lovely tints and their business is- to bring colour into a drab world. While there remain some conservative kings of commerce, the black mourning habit has decidedly diminished and many of the rather ghastly funereal habits of our immediate forefathers are going, too. We British people are not the only ones who adhered so long to the depressin? business of black mourning. The old-fashioned Dutch Afrikander was ne'ver seen without a huge pipe, a rifle and a four-inch band of' black erepe round his hat, with an armlet to match. M.A.T. often asked Piet if he had recently lost a relative, only to discover that he, a man of, say, fifty, was still, wearing mourning for his grandfather or greiit -grandfather, or some relative even more remote than that. Reference to early Victorian literature will convince the reader that families losing a member frequently lost all their savings paying for the sable expressions of woe that could be more privately and cheaply expressed.

It was like Sir Joseph Ward to desire that he be laid to rest in Bluff Cemetery, for "east, west, home is best,' , and the simple - desire will keep his HOME IS BEST, memory greener than great elaboration. Perhaps the desire for a resting place where one has spent one's boyhood is inherent in human beings. Sir Joseph was passionately attached to his boyhood's home and used to refer to the fact that in those days he was as full of tricks and vitality as most strong r healthy young people M r ho make their names known in after life. Notable instances of men of mark preferring to lay their bones rtear their boyhood's homes are those of Lord Rosebery, the famous statesman who was taken to his home cemetery on one of his farm carts accompanied by some servants and tenants, and the great Field-Marshal Haig also went to his rest on a farm cart without ostentation of' any kind. It is rather nice to know that there are people about who might be pardoned for reasonable display, and who, knowing there arepeople down on their PLTJMR AND LEAN: luck, refrain from ostea.tation. In some cases smart parties have been postponed on the very reasonable ground that people who never have parties might feel poorer for the ostentation of their better-off relatives. Many of these practical better-off people, while .cutting down their ,own social pleasures, have hypothecated the money saved for the benefit of their lesser brethren. Sure signs that the clouds were lifting would not, of course, prevent those with the fatter purses from rushing to the rescue of the lean. You noticed* of course, in the picture page of "Wednesday's "Star" a photograph' of that celebrated sporting peer, Lord Lonsdale. He is so well known that he THE BIG SMOKE, can do as he likes, and is therefore snapped at the Derby smoking- an eleven-inch cigar of stupendous rotundity. Unlike many race-day smokers, howver, the fine old crusted peer does not lick the whole length of his smoke before lighting it. But a fellow columnist in London (apparently a bosom pal of Lord Lonsdale), mentioned that he often smoked gigantic cigars without removing the paper band, a thing that is "not done." "Punch" a few years ago in a priceless picture showed the lawn on Derby Day with a baronet talking to a plethoric person. The baronet is clearly meant for Lord Lonsdale,. A lady and a new baronet are sitting on a seat. The sitting baronet says, "I wondah why a baronet with so old a title as Sir Travers de Travers should have so little dignity as to talk to so common a person." "Ah," replied the lady, "those Elizabethan baronetcies are hardly new enough to be , dignified."

A story is told by a man who knows him of the gentleman who is in the habit of buying old barques or old islands, sheep stations, and other large things. Big HIS SEAT. Charles was travelling on a train between Auckland and Wellington. He had reserved a firstclass seat. He left his seat temporarily in order to speak to a friend. A fussy person with a bag bustled in, shifted Charles' newspaper, threw his own bag in the rack, and sat down. Charles looked across and said, "Yon's ma seat!" "You ought to be in it," snapped the fussy one. "Ali'm tellin' ye, yon's ma seat!" replied Charles. "It was empty and I took it," retorted the little man, eyeing the top end of Charles and neglecting to measure the rest of him. "Ah'm tellin' ye, yon's ma seat —Ah've paid for it and Ah'm goin' to have it!" said Charles, rising to the uttermost span of his seventy-four inches, and displaying sixteen -stone wrapped in Scots tweeds. The little gentleman rose and fled. As he reached the door the guard entered. "All tickets!" he said. The fussy one showed his ticket. "You musn't travel first-class with a second-class ticket," said the guard. "You'll have to pay the difference!" "Victory!" cackled Charles, settling down and gazing at Ruapehu, which he may buy for scoria some odd time. Contemplating a photograph of Sir Joseph Ward's 1906 Ministry, one finds it inspirational to boys, for there's always room at the top. Sir Joseph Ward himROOM AT THE TOP. self began working life as a telegraph messenger: It was lately mentioned that the silvertongued Sir James Carroll was once a barefooted Maori boy. Sir William Hall-Jones was a carpenter, the Hon. James McGowan kept a small grocer's shop, and the Hon. J. A. Millar had been a sailor before the mast. THE CHILD MIND. Dear M.A.T., —Our little chap had a sentence to do for homework the other evening, and the word used was to be "eternal." On looking through Ms work afterwards I noticed he had put: "The man was sentenced to eternal life in gaol."— W.H.