THE PASSING SHOW.

Auckland Star, Volume LXV, Issue 204, 29 August 1934, Page 6

THE PASSING SHOW.

(By THE MAN ABO7JT TOWN.)

Dear M.A.T., —The ancient politician was in good fettle. Ho had been asked to address a luncheon assembly of ladies only, and, thrilled by the occasion, his heart CHERCHEZ was skipping a beat or LA FEMME. two. What could he say by way of an introduction? Ah. an inspiration! "Ladies," he began, "all my life I have been interested in the lives of famous people, and in my literary pursuits have made many little journey* into the homes of the great. To-night I understand more than ever the character of an ancient Eaetern king as for the moment I duplicate a fragment of his daily domestic life. Surrounded by so many charming ladies, I am irresistibly reminded* of. the happy luncheon lot of Solomon and his many wives. (Chuckles.) And moreover, under such circumstances I feel I must add my meed of praise to his memory ae the wisest man that ever lived." After such an introduction, the speech went like a breeze. —E.A.

Dear M.A.T., —I am not one of those disgruntled individual* who declare that discarded politicians should not dip by Government ukase into the ConTHE KINDER solidated Fund and receive WAY. a pension for life for having been defeated. I would willingly enter Parliament and leave it if by so doing I could become a pensioner with a douceur"much larger than the old age pension. In such a case, too, I should be able to pick up a retrospective "cut" instead of (were I a mere old age pensioner) waiting for October or any other State-arranged date. Do you not think, sir. that as an economic gesture the Government, which is able to extend its own life, might find it cheaper in the end to ensure that the election of any member would be for life? It would preclude the necessity of further general elections for some time, it would put a type of deserving citizen beyond the claw of poverty, and it would obviate the need for perpetual canvassing for votes, which, I am sure, State political pensioners so greatly deplore. As nothing that ie done for the amelioration of the politician, present and past, gives us any other class than that with which we are blessed, it follows that the whole machinery of filling Parliament is outworn and that, like the Civil Service, the_ jobs should be permanent. I, for one, will willingly become a permanent M.P., or, in the alternative, if elected and ultimately turned down, I will agree to accept a permanent douceur for my services to the country. Thanking you, I am, —Optimist.

It is apparent from the fearful news from London that men with money are becoming more beautiful than ever —and face-lifting is removing the crow's feet WHO'S WHO? of age and bringing back to the sere and yellow dial the cream and roses of the teens. One imagines the aged worker in official or business circles, a mass of facial wrinkles with greying thatch and down-drooped lip asking the bos* for a month off and returning with a new face, eo to speak, and being mista.ken for the office boy. An Under-Secretary with an npi if ted, face, being told to whip round to the Home Office with a brown paper parcel, would wish ho had never been born—again. This passion for new faces, of coui'.s-e, dates from the war when those incalculably smart surgeons, finding «i face partially absent, used to build a new one, so that wives repudiated husbands and there were countless not at all amusing incidents. Even criminals—as the case of Dillingcr showed—changed their faces per surgery, but this', as you are aware, did not save his face. Magazine advertisements are thick with l>eauty aids for men—how to restore the svelte line to the distended turn per belt, per corset, per pill; how to bring back the youthful charm to the aged cheek, the colour to the autumn hair or the height to the shrivelled octogenarian. If this youthful business proceeds there will be no such thing as the "old familiar faces." By the way, Voronoff, who is not so young as he used to be, got married recently. He must have had his face lifted.

No man of equal interest to Colonel Sir Maurice Paschal AJers Hankey, G.C.8., has set foot in New Zealand for long years, and he

hasn't set foot yet. He'e THE "JOLLY." coming to Australia and

to us to cast the eye of a genius on our defences. He ie, one might say, more than an admiral and more than a fieldmarshal and has without doubt told either the things they ought to know—and has been named by super-soldiers as "an organiser of victory." By the way, the fact that this eminent man's father was a South Australian may endear liim to colonial people. The Cabinet, if you do not remember, handed him out a twenty-five-thousand-pound gift in the matter of that victory organising. And what ie of uncommon interest is that the great Hankey, before he took to the high plane of politics, was an officer in the Royal Marine Artillery—and therefore, as Kipling says, "Soldier an' sailor, too." Hear the inimitable Rudyard:

As I was spittin , into the Ditch aboard o' the Crocodile, I seed a man on a man-o'-war got up in the Reg'lars' style. 'E was scrapin' the paint from off of 'er plates, an' I sez to 'im, "Oo are you?" Sez 'e, "I'm a Jolly—'Er Majesty's Jolly— soldier an' sailor, too!" Now 'is work begins by Gawd knows when, an' 'is work is never through: 'E isn't one of the reg'lar Line, nor 'e isn't one o' the crew, 'E's a kind of a giddy harumfrodite—soldier and sailor, too. An" after, I met 'im all over the wor:a". . . . And if ever a man was versatile, the "Jolly" who comes to New Zealand to look over the defences is the one.

A message from France indicates that old cures for old diseases still persist. Rene had hiccoughs. His friend, Jean, having apparently heard from grandSHOCKS. mere that a shock would

cure hiccoughs, banned off a revolver just as Rene hiccoughed himself into the line of fire. He cured his friend right enough, for he is dead. Once upon a time a New Zealand soldier lay down with a rifle and drew a bead on the enemy. A fellow soldier, seeing him lying down, felt funny, ■and for a joke stole up behind him, laid his rifle across, hie friend's shoulder and pulled the trigger. It was so funny that the soldier has been stone deaf ever since. Once upon a time the proletariat had been told by grannie that if a youngster had whooping cough (which is of nervous origin) a good hammering would bring about a cure, and as those were the days of that pious nonsense "spare the rod and spoil the child," many children were "cured" for ever by their loving parents. Other people with whooping children were frequently advised to live near a gasworks, the breathing of the fumes being considered a cure. You are probably aware that amateur physicians have from time immemorial administered shocks as curative agents. They used to cast devils out of people with \yhips or sticks. The "devils" were most likely epilepsy, and it is not at all uncommon even in these days for ignorant persons to beat an epileptic back to normality. Mind you, 6hoek may be useful if the right person (other than a schoolmaster) administers it. Perhaps you have never seen a doctor take a new-born baby up by a leg, and, holding him upside down, slap him soundly into life?