THE PASSING SHOW

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 31, 6 February 1936, Page 6

THE PASSING SHOW

(By THE MAN ABOUT TOWN.) Dear M.A.T., —In the "Star" of the 23rd ult I noticed a par. under the heading "Names of Cheer." Mention was made ot' one inn in Suffolk called "The Case THE OLD INN. is Altered." I thought you would be interested to know that that small inn was at one time willed "The Live and Let Live," but that after the war the name was changed to the one now borne, namely, "The Case is Altered. — Homie. A lar°e. fair man brings in a copy of tne Stockholm "Dagens Nyheter," indicating a paragraph. -It might be C.reek 01 Irf.rr.il P<l ° 1 present writer, so the KINGS AT PLAY, fair man read tiiar. the King of Sweden weighs only eight stone, w six feet five inches high and seventy-seven years of age. Ihe pani; <uaph says he "doesn't carry an ounce ot *pait Uesli." It seems obvious enough, unless ti.M. carries sandwiches for lunch. This reinarkaole monarch, according to the paragraph, witnthe notable Swedish player, Garrell, recently beat two of the smartest young tennis plaveis the country. The King goes under the name of "Air G." when playing tennis, but the incognito would never obscure a king so long and so thin as that. Mr. G. took three ha d drives in succession and killed the last one.

You remember, of course, the case of the Ponsonby lady and gentleman who went to Colombo" for a holiday? As they got oft the steamer the lady, having HELLO! HELLO!! seen her bags gathered HELLO!!! >" il heap, suddenly exclaimed, "There, John! I knew I'd forgotten something—l leit the electric stove 011!" Here is an even truer one of domestic tragedy. It did not happen in New Zealand because if one naid it "id there would he "Please explains" -and all that sort of thing. A telephone subscriber went away leaving two domestic helps in charge of the home. When he returned he received an official bill for one hundred and fifty pounds for telephone calls. He laughed wryly and then he rushed round to the post office to tell the official that it was absurd, preposterous, impossible. He had been away for a month. The telephone, of course, hadn't been used nil that time. "Oh, yes, it was," replied the official. "It was used frequently for calls to Canada." And, by the record, he showed him that it was indeed so. The alarmed householder hurried home and made inquiries. Cine of the maids tljen told him cheerfully, "'Yes, I used it fourteen times for calls to my brother in Canada, but it was always after seven o'clock at night, and here is the fourcecn shillings." Among others, "Humorist" is facetious about a yearning headline in the "Star" of last week. "O For a Wind!" was appropriate to the weather and ANSWER TO the Anniversary—a sigh PRAYER, of longing for zephyrs, a little orison raised to high heaven by the owners of "White Sails 011 the Waitomata." Correspondents sending the clipped line enclose news pictures of later date showing that "the bright requests" by the "Star" had been heard and answered. Could it be explained that the impassioned cry "O For a Wind!" was for the day alone? There had been 110 conspiracy with the elements to stage the exorbitant display that ensued. No communication had been had with the Marine or any other Department. Deeply regretted as the subsequent destruction of small craft was, not a single wreck, not a flood, not a fallen tree can be sheeted home to the innocent lad whose impassioned prayer "0 For a Wind!" was so tragically answered. One remembers writing a bit of rhyme once entitled "Let It Rain!" in facetious reference to four weeks' continual slop. That evening Pluvius withdrew into his overcoat and a rainless period of three weeks followed —so, you see, bits of type splashed here and there do not necessarily affect the elements —and the "Star" did not leave seventy people marooned in a northern train for three days. Currently reported that of one hundred members of 'local bodies gathered at one meeting only one was a lady. She assumed that her fellow members might MAY WE SMOKE? be perishing for a smoke, and permission was obtained. In a brighter, better age it is possible Mint of one hundred members of local bodies gathered together the proportion-of sexes may be fifty-fifty and that the whole body will be catholic in its exchange of the universal cigarette. The attitude towards tobacco has changed so completely that grandmother borrows cigarettes from her grandchildren end brothers pinch their sisters' "fags" because they are stronger. You, of course, are too young to remember when passionate clergymen, eschewing the pipe, the cigar and the cigarette, went round saying, "If man had been intended to smoke he would have had a chimney in his head," spoke trenchantly of the horrid effect of the weed on the health of the people, and promised a hot hereafter for the incinerators. Since which clergymen and the wives of the same have become chain smokers and the Carrie Nations of society liave ceased to prattle. Carrie Nation, if you remember, was the American lady who went about snatching cigars and cigarettes from the mouths of men under the impression that she was curing them of the habit and guiding them heavenwards. It is not ladylike nowadays to do this thing, but it is permissible for Romeo and Juliet, reduced to one cigarette between the two, to take alternate whiffs. As for public bodies and smoking during session— many of the bodies actually sit with open windows and in their shirt sleeves nowadays. ' Wonders never cease.

Currently said that a Christclmrch man, absenting himself quite a lifetime from Xew Zealand, returned to find the ashtrays in a hotel nailed to the tables. THIS HONESTY. Infers, perhaps, that during the past thirty-eight years the population of these isles has learnt those acquisitive habits which \vc formerly felt were the special sins of others. It would lie necessary to make a liouse-to-house visit of the entire series of hotels in Xew Zealand to ascertain if the licensees, noting this passion for ashtrays, had nailed the whole series down. One knows several men who have never pinched an ashtray in their lives. Pursuing the subject of nailing pinchable articles down, one remembers that the breech block of a navy gun was gathered in by a souvenir hunter in Auckland some years ago. Still, it didn't prove that the population of Xew Zealand had grown so dishonest that it went from warship to warship picking , up unnailed breech blocks and getting away with a silver-backed hairbrush or so .just out of pure love and affection for the Service. It has frequently been observed that apparent customers, invading great department stores have been known to remove goods, carelessly left unnailed. Slillions of pounds' worth of exquisite goods are left bare to the fingers of the proletariat, suggesting the entire wire-netting of the entire stock of all the shops to prevent the odd pincher from pinching and the land from the frightful accusation that dishonesty has grown during the last forty years. Mind you, the nailing down of an ashtray to prevent a treasured guest from pinching it might spur him to acquisition. One remembers a penny that was nailed to a counter in Auckland. Hundreds of men (relatively pious) dug for that penny with pocket knives merely because it was nailed down. Present writer, aching for an ashtray, refuses to imperil his immortal soul by digging one off a hotel smoking room table. ITe'll use the lid of a buckshee cigarette tin.