THE PASSING SHOW.

Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 193, 17 August 1931, Page 6

THE PASSING SHOW.

(By THE MAN ABOUT TOWN.)

Spring is coming. One lias watched daily for a week the rejuvenescence of a stuccofaced building which has gloomed in paintlessness for years ana PAINT UP. years, like hundreds of

its stucco-faced compeers casting dark shadows on the lives of city people and adding to the pip the people led. The painters starting the job attired in spotless white have, through a week, showed evei \ shade from pale pink to something like dark maroon, thus giving the dark by-street a touch of gaiety that is wanted so much, me idea of permitting old plaster-faced buildings to remain their native colour has a dismal effect on the souk of citizens, and one hopes that the pink effort being made will induce many owners to break out into a wliolc spectrum of colours. Modern buildings nowadays in London and other large cities have often important colour schemes, so thatmaoj streets look like flowering gardens. One is sure that painters will agree that the time k ripe for rainbow effects.

During the war, when every line the soldier wrote was censored, the army authorities issued what Tommy called "whizzbang postcards. These contained WHIZZBANGS. a list of short, sharp news items, thus: "Dear Mother—l am quite well. I am in hospital. I have been wounded. I have not been wounded. I received your parcel. 1 have received no parcel," and so forth. The soldiei crossed out what he did not want, lhis wai idea has been seized in America, on the authority of a Keuter message printed in London. It speaks of printed pink apology carUS, to be sent by guests to their hostesses alter having enjoyed themselves not wisely but too well. It is unnecessary to say thai what does very well for London doesn't do at all toi Auckland, and that the list following has beer, severely pruned. The cards are drawn up a* follows": M regrets exceedingly his (or her) deplorable conduct while a guest at your dance (or party) last evening, and humbly craves your pardon for the breach of etiquette marked below: Striking hostess with bottle; spanking hostess; excessive screaming; vulgar language; extreme intoxication; damage to furniture; throwing glasses; indiscreet pettin" (Amrlico "flirting"); refusing to go home.

The early appearance of clematis locally has been hailed with a glad literary cry and photographs, out no one has yet instructed y ° * the public in the wellCLEMATIS. known method of gathering this lovely flower from the bush where later on it will star-snaii"-le the dark leaves and peep above the scrub. The clematis often appears to have leapt straight from the ground to its first hold, say, twelve or fourteen feet up, proving, of course, that it has taken so long to climb so high that the ladder by which it has climbed has decayed and disappeared. Therefore the popular way of gathering clematis is to leave the motor car on the road at the first eight of white stare, to grasp the vine near the ground, and to drag the whole mass down, escaping back to the car, and returning ill triumph to town. The gatherer has the proud feeling when he has utterly destroyed the plant that no one can wave a hand towards the bush and say, "Ah! clematis, lovely, ain't it?" The gatherer has the further satisfaction that next day his trophy will be well on the way to death, and that the day after it will require decent interment. Nature, however, w so persistent that despite these soulful gatherers she comes to the rescue and does it all over again. Still, there is the other well-known New Zealand plan of finding a nice bit of bush (including clematis) and burning the lot. The latter plan is far ahead of the mere foray in the car and the dragging-down method. People who own bits of bush love the flower gatherers!

It is communicated from the South that a school lad who used the top of his stocking in which to park his caligraphic implements, required surgical aid to PEN IS vJg out a nib. For many MIGHTIER. years many lads have done this thing, perhaps because, with the average school uniform of shirt and pants, they are not possessed of the twelve pockets they will rejoice in when they grow up. But the mishap to the lad reminded an ancient of the inventors of this method of carrying edged tools. Long, long ago, before these lads were born, mounted soldiers (barring cavalry) on service carried bayonets. Hundreds of them, by design or accident, discarded the scabbards, and it was the fashion to thrust the bayonet into the top of the puttee or legging. Rarely in that campaign wa«s the bayonet used for any but peaceful pursuits, although some New Zealanders did rather distinguish themselves with it. But as a tin-opener, the bayonet was most acceptable, the hammer usually being a rock or a horse peg mallet. The bayonet, in fact, became almost the universal horse peg, for the wooden ' variety, together with ''built-up , ' ropes and so forth, soon went west with continuous hammering. Of course, if you bash the hilt end of a bayonet long enough it will burr to the extent that the thing won't tit on a rifle ever any more, so that on one occasion when a ragged outfit was called upon to "fix bayonet*," there was nothing doing. Perhaps you know tho story of the mounted rifle regiment which was given, strict instructions to make no noise one nasty-night. The silence was broken by a terrific hammering. Scared troops hurried to the spot ready to either kill or arrest the person who disobeyed orders. It was a ■celebrated general (sinfle dead) pounding a bayonet into the ground to tie his horse to.

Current history mentions the pride of the sporting gentleman down South who shot a white hind with blue ribs. Almost any man with a gun would be glad SPECIMENS. to kill a hind so rare in

case she might at some time produce other albinos with blue ribs. Naturalists welcome the deaths of almost anything that is rare, and countless proud breasts swell ;tt the possession in museums and so forth of specimens which have no living relatives. One imagines this passion in man for the slaying of rarities was even more common when reel men and others collected scalps. The noble red man used to take great pride in scalping his friend the enemy, and there is no doubt that if Sitting Bull had come across an albino man with perfectly colourless hair and pink eyes he would have given the scalp nride of place on the ridgepole of his wigwam. There would have been keen joy among the natives in cannibal days at the capture of a red-headed supper, and no doubt the chiefs would have played at knucklebones to decide which should eat him. If this passion for novelties really grows with the centuries there is no reason why naturalists should not vie with each other for the possession of rare specimens of man. In not so very remote times, as we are informed by a celebrated New Zealander, there was keen rivalry for the possession of tattooed heads. There is no reason at all in Nature why this passion should not some day be extended to heads that are not tattooed. THOUGHTS FOR TO-DAY. Are there not women who fill our vase with wine and rases to the brim, so that wine runs over and fills the house with perfume; who inspire us with courtesy; who unloose our tongues, and r/e speak; who anoint our eyes, and we see? —IJ. W. Emerson. To mortal men great loads allotted be; But of all packs, no pack like poverty. —Herrick. ,