THE PASSING SHOW.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIII, Issue 57, 8 March 1932, Page 6

THE PASSING SHOW.

(By THE MAN ABOUT TOWN.)

A TOPICAL ALPHABET. A's for the city of Auckland. And how ! B's for the better times coming. C's for the cash we'd like more of just now, D's for our dairy trade humming. E's for employment, that thrice-blessed word, F is for farmer. Stout boy! G's for the grouser, so often now heard, H is his "help" we enjoy. I's that eternal small word of one letter, J's for the "home" on the hill. K's for the King, whom we hope is much better, L stands for pounds on the bill. M's fox the mail boat we welcome each week, N stands for "no mail for me." O is the cricket score none of us seek, P is for pay-day. Whoopee! Q's for the question that's put by the member, R's for the rest we'd suggest. S is the shocks we've survived since December, T's for the next cricket Test. U's for the umpteenth adit, on the tax, And V brings these lines to a close, As space and ability equally lacks. Wiat X and Z stand for, God knows. —A.H.

The saddest words in all the world, once declared a facetious scribe, are not "What might have been!" but "Also started." M.A.T.

was reminded of "Dangle" THOSE Thompson's witticism the "WINNERS." other day when lie happened to meet a couple of friends with sporting inclinations. The first assured him that General Lu was a dead cert, for the first race. M.A.T. assured him that lie never backed horses under any circumstances, but his friend besought him to make a note of it for the financial deliglitment of any who might be in needy circumstances. Other "good things" to play up the winnings on were Royal Gallant, Te Money and Llanore. Idle curiosity impelled M.A.T. to glance through the list of winners that evening, and he found that not one of the four produced a dividend, the nearest being Royal Gallant, which ran third! M.A.T. was reminded of that lugubrious comedian, Alfred Lester, who figured as Peter Doody, the very eartlibound jockey amid the merry and lightsome "Arcadians" in the musical comedy of that name. Alfred used to bemoan the fact that all the horses he rode were too polite. "How d'yer mean, 'too polite'?" asked his vis-a-vis, and the eartlibound horseman would explain that every gee-gee he bestrode developed the habit of turning his head during the race and saying to the other quadrupeds, "After you, sir; after you!"

The Ancient Mariner had been taken for a spin—or should it be called a splurge, or even a swish?—on the ocean deep in a friend's speed boat. Ho was modRIGHT erately, but only inoderABOUT TURN, ately, impressed by the speed. "Good heavens!" said the A.M. "I can get that sensation in a motor car. For real speed give me one of the old-time clipper ships running her easting down. Anybody can chug-chug up and down a sheltered harbour in a skimming dish that wouldn't stand a blow, and never has to. Besides, there's no real strategy in it. Might interest you to know that there could be." And the A.M. proceeded to tell the story of a race that caused a good deal of fun and not a little excitement in far-off Rotumah, a tiny island in the Fijian group, about three hundred miles north of Suva. The Christmas festivities at Rotumah were enlivened by a race for motor launches in which the conditions were both novel and sporting. The boats were handicapped, according to horsepower, design, etc., and it was laid down that they should start in opposite directions from the starting point as soon as the race began, and then, on the firing of the second gun, should wheel round and make for the finishing point. The race was won by the boat which was considered to be the outsider in the race, and owned and skippered by a veteran missionary who had never been suspected of high-speed proclivities. It was merely a matter of "strategy and tactics," as the military handbooks express it. The skipper had a welltrained crew of native "boys," and when the race began they trimmed the boat by sitting so near the bows that the stern was lifted almost clear, and the propeller lost practically all its power. The boat had been the laughing stock of the other competitors, and its slow progress evoked roars ol derisive laughter. Then came the second gun, and the .skipper give the order to his well-drilled crew, "Right about turn!" at which signal they distributed themselves according to plan, in the midships and stern seats. Curiously enough, the cranky machinery suddenly began to show amazing efficiency, and the good ship came home an easy first. As the good padre said, if it wasn't muscular Christianity it was at least helping Providence.

The Archduke Leopold Salvator of Hapsburg has got himself into hot water by appearing at a Viennese night club wearing a gleaming row of medals and the ETIQUETTE. Order of the Golden Fleece.

The Archduke appears to have lived up to the best traditions of the haut monde, pre-war vintage, in the matter of dress, for we read that he wore the traditional hunting costume, consisting of a green suit and shorts, heavy stockings, and hobnailed boots. Pity he couldn't have brought along a fowling-piece and a couple of hunting knives, or even an alpenstock .and a boarhound. One Count Arco Zinneberg protested that the Order of the Golden Fleece should be worn round the throat and not on the waistcoat, whilst a Prince of Bourbon-Parma (now where have I heard that name before?) accused the Archduke of smirching the memory of the Royal House by wearing his decorations on a hunting suit and in a night club. The Archduke archly refused to remove the decorations, and promptly became the recipient of a series of challenges to duels. Somehow or other, one had gained the impression that archdukes were an extinct variety nowadays and that most of the Grar.l Dukes in the erstwhile gay capitals of Europe were either toiling in the timber camps of Russia or driving taxi cabs in Paris, or serving "steak-a-de-oyst" in restaurants. Apparently they still "remember Vienna," however, and the city of brave men and beauteous dames still lives up to its prewar reputation. "Charley's Bar" is not a very high-sounding name for Vienna's most fashionable haunt, but then neither is the "Ham Bone" or the "Forty Threes," for the meeting place of England's best and brightest. "The Embassy Club" sounds much more rich and elegant, but there isn't a great deal of difference. What's in a name, after all? Perhaps the Archduke Leopold Salvator of Hapeburg is a democrat at heart, like the Prince of Wales. After all, why shouldn't he wear his order round his neck? The P. of W. has been known to appear in public with a sweater under his dress jacket. THOUGHTS FOR TO-DAY. Life's a fight between the setters up and the pullers down, the affirmers and the deniers. —Hugh Walpole. Faith is jumping out of an aeroplane with a parachute, and gradually you find the parachute has opened and it is carrying you.— Christine Orr. Our span of life may be brief, but why make it narrow? —Anon. The happy life is to an extraordinary extent the same as the good life.—Bertrand Russell. "There is no error which the Court is not capable to correct, and, as long as it is not done with deliberate purpose or desire to overreach, it does not exist for the purpose of discipline alone, but rather to see that substantial justice is done between the parties."— Lord Justice Bowen, in the Court of Appeal, London.