PERSONALITY OF THE WEEK.

Auckland Star, 2 September 1933, Page 8

PERSONALITY OF THE WEEK.

Intriguing to observe how many extremely busy men are true home lovers and notable gardeners, Mr. Raymond • Ferner, Mayor of Mount Albert, has his NO. 402. home and garden right on the hill itself. With wife and family he finds time, being otherwise unassisted, to keep two acres ablaze with beauty. He has lived in Mount Albert all his life—was born not far off it and likes it still. He is a barrister and solicitor of the firm of Melville, Ferner and Broun. Went to the Auckland Grammar School, and to the Auckland College of the New Zealand University. Mrs. Ferner, his mother, is gratefully and widely Temembered as the founder of the Sunshine Association. Raymond loves sunshine, too, for other people as well as self. Golf and tennis attract him. He has not graduated in bowls —and "anyhow he was onlv born recently—in 1894 —taihoa! He footslogged with the Auckland Infantry during the Great Mistake and bore away grievous souvenirs of Fritz—pieces of bomb. Modest man, hard to pump, but lyrical on municipal matters once started. Keen on finance, as all on the council and those in his Mayoral jurisdiction know. He thinks things are fairly cleared up now. There are two Ferner sons.

By profound management and the rationing of the jewel supply there is a small recrudescence of activity in the diamond trade —a matter of moment to GEMS. every newly - engaged young lady. The only possible interest in a diamond is that it may be shown—and sold. When it is owned it has to be guarded'like the apple of one's eye, it is an incentive to crime, avarice, and every kind of cliiciuicery— and nobody feels fuller fed or better clothed for having looked at a bit of carbon imprisoned for a million years or so in blue clay. One of the crack diamonds in present gem history is the Porter-Rhodes stone, a scrap of a thing weighing only fiftysix carats, flawless and pure white. It has never been mounted or worn—for fear somebody should pinch it—so what's the good? The owners want fifty thousand pounds for t—and the owners are a syndicate of London jewellers. The interesting point about this bit of carbon is that an old Austrian nobleman is expected to buy it for his. young wife, who apparently has bushels of diamonds—none of which can be eaten. A larger diamond was the Rising Sun. It weighed one hundred and two carats, but was yellow, and fetched only two thousand eight hundred pounds. No doubt the black boy who scooped it up in Kimberley clay got anything from nincpencc to a shilling for finding it.

A scientific slugger yclept Mike Gately threatens to emasculate the noble art by the introduction and use of the pneumatic boxing glove, thus rendering a THE NEW K.O. biff on the point innocuous and the count out unnecessary. Pneumatic glove battles, bereft of Marquis of Queensberry rules, will interest the crowd almost as much as would a Sunday school picnic with pink lemonade as a pick-me-up. Mr. Gately claims that even Camera cannot break one of these pneumatic mitts, so that neither knock-out nor puncture will count for points, seeing that nothing of that kind can happen. The elimination of seconds, towels, surgeons and referees may follow this harmless child's play, "and if the late Conan Doyle (a notable admirer of the art) can be induced to interview his spirit companions Savers and Heenan it will be interesting to know what these bare-flat gentlemen think of the new gloves with the wind up. Two generations of the new slugger habituated to wind-tilled gloves would produce a type of baby-faced pugilist who could be used for displays at annual conventions and American revival meetings. The pneumatic glove for pugilists will have the excellent result of introducing into the ring ladies who up to now have been debarred by convention. There is no reason whatever why the pneumatic idea should not be applied to the rope ' encircling the ring, or why the clothes worn ! by the. antagonists should not be prepared J prior to the onslaught with a bike pump. If the risks are to be eliminated from boxing. ' harmlessness may yet bo introduced to field ! sporte, including bowls and football. A man hankering for danger may have to fall back on cricket and the "body-line."