PERSONALITY OF THE WEEK.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIII, Issue 263, 5 November 1932, Page 8

PERSONALITY OF THE WEEK.

lie is "Bob" to his intimates —and the same in a respectful whisper to Mount Albert Grammar School hoys —for he is a master at that popular school. Apart NO. 363. from his scholastic duties, Mr. 11. B. Hardy has been addicted to tennis in its more expert manifestations for years and years, being president of the Auckland Tennis Association for three seasons. He played a smashing racquet, too, for 'Varsity and w r as club captain for that seat of learning for many years. Was senior player for Canterbury and Haivke's Bay, too. A redoubtable Rugby man also, who has represented both Canterbury and Auckland 'Varsity Colleges in the great game, and was one of the New Zealand 'Varsity team to play the cracks of the sister seat of knowledge in Sydney. "Bob" lias served on the Auckland Centre swimming executive. Any game that hoys can play —including the game of life—suits this keen scholar and sportsman.

A trade paper sacred to the hardware business retails a .bit of inside history relative to the sister industry of newspapers, mentioning that tlio things that IN SHANGHAI, happen behind the scenes

in the newsroom never get into the paper—except in Shanghai. There had, it seems, been incidents of a regrettable nature among the printers, most of whom, of course, were of an Eastern colour. They had been demanding redress of grievances and took a hitherto unheard ofi method of being heard. The whole literary stall", including the editor, having folded up its pad and gone home, the revolutionists heaved a few columns "of news out of the paper and inserted an exhaustive and highly-colourcd account of their complaints, demands and the date of their intended strike. In the morning the subscribers were amazed at the absence of news. "The Ironmonger" is silent as to what the editor, the directors and other officials thought of the new style of the paper, but suggests that in the hands of a clever writer of fiction a comic short story might bo written on the incident. 0. Henry, however, is unfortunately dead.

No historic survival is so inexplicable as the celebration of Guy Fawkes' Day, "when British people express in pyrotechnics joy at the failure of the YorkBONFIRE. shire soldier of fortune to

blow Parliament up. The conspirators thought so little of Guy that they didn't even permit him to go to the meeting at which the plot was hatched, but thought that an old soldie"r like Guy was just the sort of lad to handle the gunpowder and sent him •to the job —and to the rack. As a matter of justice and as a thanksgiving for commercial benefits received makers of fireworks should gratefully crect a monument to Guy on the Thames Embankment. Yet it appears that the highly-xespectablo Fawkes family, which still flourishes in "t'biggest caanty," receive absolutely no royalties from firework manufacturers, nor does Parliament pension surviving Fawkes, who, though comfortably off, would dearly love a retrospective pension over the past two hundred and twenty-six years. The one expression of opinion by the late Mr. Fawkes has, of course, its repercussions, and members of the family have reached high place in the Navy, where a man may go in for explosions on a much larger scale without - interference from the police.

Mother Nature threw down a good Friday yesterday. It was the kind of day you'd choose to take a. potential customer to the

dear old farm—he'd be THE WATERMEN, bound to buy. A globetrotter looking at tlio blue and gold of the Waitemata would have merely queried, "See Naples and die ? I prefer to see Auckland and live!" A cheeky little water taxi sitting on her stern and displacing iridescent salt water at a cup pace looked like a racing gem in a setting of sapphire. And the ship's engineer mentioned to M.A.T. (who has only known Auckland for three or four decades), "Times change, don't they?" and spoke wistfully of Harry Keene, .Tim Conolly, Jack Griffiths and other Auckland watermen of the old days who didn't ,do the distance covered by the sea taxi in nearly so short a time. Mentioned, too, that the watermen had their enclosure somewhere about the spot where now the already handsomelyweathered Ferry Building rears its bricks and old-gold stones. The old sailormen who used to perform prodigies of rowing and sailing used to have a shed of their own and slept there —and Harry, Jim and Jack and their mates would turn out at any minute of the day or night to dodge about a harbour that is so changed to-day. The engineer fancies that launches first began to chuff around in 1900 or thereabouts, from which time, of course, the watermen pulled their oars inboar-2 and made the painter fast for keejxs..

A THOUGHT FOR TO-DAY. "4 You must live to-day at your very best; The work of the world "rs done by'fewj God asks that a part bo done by you. 1 v tttUn