THE PASSING SHOW.

Auckland Star, Volume LXV, Issue 39, 15 February 1934, Page 6

THE PASSING SHOW.

(By THE MAN ABOUT TOWN.)

Dear M.A.T., —I suppose you are persona grata in the lobbies of the House of Lords, or wherever it is you spend your long vacation, so perhaps you could DUTCH AUCTION, whisper this little bit of information in the right quarter. In Annam, public service is rewarded by the conferring of hereditary titles in a nicely-graded scale. Each subsequent generation, however, automatically falls into the rank next below until in a short time the descendants of a great man iind themselves commoners again if: they do nothing to win fresli honours. So clogs or sandals or whatever it is they wear soon come back to bare feet again.—S.B.

Dear M.A.T., —Could tou give a constant reader of your column some ad.vice on a matter of State? I note that Sir lan Hamilton

I has been to Germany to IA SHAVING-MUG. receive and take back to | Blighty some drums left by his regiment at Ostend during the war. For nearly twenty years now I have used a German mug, as issued to Fritz troops, for my daily shave, but now my hand trembles as I use it, for I have that awful feeling I might be the start of another war if' I don't post it back to "Hindy" with my compliments and thanks. I would be glad to hear what you and other statesmen would do under the circumstances. —The Old Swad.

He chuckled. "Why," said he, "do you always laugh at the word 'Waipukurau'?" pointing out, however, that one fails to roar with mirth when - it is WHY PUCK? pronounced "Why-Pook-a-Row," reserving the mirth for the more frequent "Wliy-Puck-a-Row." Present writer for several decades believed that "Tiinbuctoo" was the name of some imaginary place to which you were consigned by humorists, until he found it on a map, much to his surprise. He knows people who have actually seen it, and have been there— Ha! ha! One feels quite sure that to myriads of people Tooting—either Upper, Lower or Bee —signifies the humorist's invention of nonexistent places, like the Australian "Speehwah" (where the tarboys are all on horseback), Lethe and a number of others. Very likely you didn't know that Looe was a real place until you saw the How exceedingly well-worn jest. The man at the railway station ticket window hands over his money and says, '"Two to Looe," and the official replies, "Pip! Pip!"

In our amiable desire to be "more like London every day," we have adopted among other things a system of postal indicators. Thus if at the foot of PLEASE EXPLAIN, one's address on a letter one writes, for instance, "Auckland 5.2," we obviate the frightful possibility that the authorities may deliver the reply to Christehurch T. 3, or Dunedin U.lo. It is obvious that the public has not been as obedient to the crack of the official whip as usual, and that the Post Office must discipline these recalcitrant souls. Here, then, is a letter —one among many thousands—which on its back has the regulation warning in black on a ruled blue label: "If you show on your letters the postal indicator 5.2, your correspondents may use it, and so help* to avoid delay in delivery." The letter is on His Majesty's Service, emanating from the Government Buildings at Wellington, and therefore from the very heart and hotbed of officialism, discipline, coercion, taxation, routine—Government. The address on the envelope has everything one could possibly desire except the postal indicator the blue label on the flap preaches so earnestly about. The old adage "Physician, heal thyself" seems applicable.

The hop© that the stalwart and independent citizens of this land may he able to keep organised and permanent pauperism going

throughout the coming WEDDING BELLS. yea« seems to be ex-

pressed by some Southern relief workers. The idea appears to be for recipients of the dole with its accompanying weed pruning to marry as soon as possible, so that man and wife may proudly claim State sustenance, to be handed on to future stalwarts. On the dictum ofi the sacred writings, "The poor ye have always with ye," and even in remote former times, aid was forthcoming for newly-weds who saw no prospect personally, of permanent, 6elf-earned income. In the "London Magazine" of 1868 there is the following paragraph: "Were married in the parish church at Hendon, Middlesex (to-day a highly important flying station), by the Bev. Mr. Aldrich ten young couples. Each couple was given ten shillings for the wedding ring, ten shillings for the wedding dinner, forty shillings for useful household goods, the marriage fees to be paid also. To encourage an increase in the population, two [guineas will be paid after two years for the first healthy child of a year old, and three guineas for the second healthy child. To each i couple also was given a tract intituled 'The Whole Duty of Man.'" The difference between this sort of tiling and the sort of thing hoped for in New Zealand is that the money for the Hendon marriage payments had been left by a philanthropist in his will, the will stating that the payments should be continued for ever and ever.

A Brisbane message intimates that the blackfellows whom the Bananalanders would so love to shoot up have been guilty of kindness to white men and of THE CROCODILES, heroism in tight places. They carried an ill and starving white man for forty-seven miles, swimming with him over flooded rivers, one infested with crocodiles. Perhaps the abos. splashed enough to frighten the crocs., fior a croc, is a wily hunter and loves not danger. Not a single blackfellow picked up a crocodile or dragged him ashore, as they apparently do in Africa. Gordon Makepiece, in his book about "Safari Sam," gives Sam's account of a fight with a croc. Ben Grbenwald, a powerful Boer transport rider, camped with his mates on a croc.-infested river, went swimming with them. They beat tin cans and yelled lustily to frighten the beasts. Having had a swim, all (except Ben) left the water Ben had his eye on a seven-foot croc., and the croc, had his eye on Ben. The mates spotted the little affair and went for rifles. "Sh-h-h!" said Ben. "Don't make such a noise—you'll frighten him," dived under the water, came up alongside the animile, seized him round the middle, and lifted him out of the water. Groenwald, after a struggle, swam to the hank scratched and bruised, but otherwise unscathed. Ben, according to Sam, merely remarked that a croc, can't turn his head without turning his whole length—hence the plavfiul wrestling match. One imagines that a seven-foot croc, would weigh about four hundredweight, so that to lift such as him from the water, hold him up with the hands overhead, and to swim by foot paddling ashore is not without skill. Sam told the story to a newspaper man—so it must be true.

THOUGHTS FOR TO-DAY. Experience is untranslatable. We write it in the cipher of our sufferings, and the key is hidden in our memories.—Jerome K. Jerome. The power men possess to annoy me, I give them.—Emerson. ° Believe in God. Believe in people. Believe in yourself. Then go ahead! If you doubt, you will worry. If you worry, you will fail.— J. F. Berry, LLJD.