THE PASSING SHOW.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 170, 20 July 1936, Page 6

THE PASSING SHOW.

(By THE MAN ABOUT TOWN.)

This (Monday) morn was bleakish and wintry. It had been a pretty awful night and rained most of it, so one was not prepared for a full-grown, recentlyTHE PLUM. ripened plum among the morning mail. "A City Resident" sent this reminder of poetic things, ineludin-7 ''If winter comes shall spring be long delayed?" saying it is rather rare for a plum tree to bear fruit in winter. The plum now lies on the table, and present recipient moves that it be printed. Thanks very much, "A City Resident." The chairman of a fire board has mentioned that he knew of a fireplace without a chimney. It presumably looked well even if there was no outlet. New tenants "ALL built a fire in the fireCONVENIENCES." place, with unhappy results. Tenants arriving from other countries and being unused to the habits of this one, sometimes make mistakes. There is the poignant Wellington story of the tenants who took a bungalow on the heights. The house had been empty for some weeks and the new housewife threw up all the windows and turned 011 every available tap among other hygienic measures. This being accomplished, the family preparing for the first meal.in the dear young home (copper and tubs) turned a tap to fili the kettle. It was as dry as a wooden god. The next-door neighbours were astounded to receive early applications for the loan of a kettleful, while the new man tenant* communicated violently with the land agent. "There's no water in the taps," he raved. "You must have been turning them on," purred the agent. "Of course I let them run to clean them out," screamed the tenant. "You've emptied the tanks," explained the land agent. "They'll be full again in a few days—it looks like rain." ' "Ex-R.F." mentions that he observed a girl mingling with the early morning office crowd wearing a military officer's trench coat which bore upon the "NOT PROPERLY right shoulder the insigDRESSED." ilia of a lieutenant and on the left the pip of a "second loot." He says she was oblivious in this sacred matter, and one hasn't the least doubt that this is true, for young ladies are like that. A man strolling down Queen Street with tweed pants and an admiral's hat would feel frightful. Women wear "near uniform" as an extra charm, and there is every kind of tin hat in felt for the beautification of Maud. The young lady who got the pip—or more accurately the three pips—would not be aware that she was infringing K.R. if anybody 011 earth liked to make a fuss about it. During the war many he-men —including selected gentlemen from the civil police forces —wore complete military uniform for espionage service. Post-war, there followed imitations of uniform for ladies' wear, and the ferocity of the man-fighting garments was mitigated in the feminine imitation of cavalry coats in brilliant hues, soldier hats of much sauciness, and what looked like wound stripes on Mary's sleeves. And if one wants to be captious about pips for Priscilla, one has to report that one saw an ex-soldier lumping bags of cement in a regulation khaki jacket only yesterday. It's against K.R.! Faint documents are the bugbear of courts, newspaper offices and countinghouses. .Mr. Justice Callan recently suggested that a faintly-typed document FAINT TAPS. was so troublesome that it ought to have bepn handwritten, which reminds one that at the time existing old lawyers were young articled clerks the whole weary business of the written legal document was done with t,he pen —and much of it by the grey goose quill or any oifher kind of quill liable to scratch and splutter. A sudden ukase by our dictators that typewriters should be abolished on the sound ground that it would instantly lead to the employment of clerks, engrossers and I pictorial writers by the gross is indicated. Formerly (and not so long ago) the preparation of legal documents consisted in the drafting by a competnent lawyer in crabbed hieroglyphic and the copying subsequently by thoroughly tamed scriveners with an accuracy and beauty highly gratifying to the client who paid the costs. To-day the scrivener sits in his (or her) swivel chair and takes in triplicate in, say, an hour or two—per carbon or other multiplying methods—what would have taken dear old pa three days or more. As it was sometimes necessary to read documents, handwriting was often legible. You remember, of course, that the famous serjeant barrister in Bardell v. Pickwick wrote so abominably that nobody could read his remarks except his pampered clerk, so that the law was often unduly protracted. Now if that old clerk had had to make triplicates with worn carbons, a bad ribbon and a machine that jumped all the "e's." the justices of Pickwick days would not have looked up to the roof like Wellcr and his lordship did— they would have hit the roof. On the whole, however, don't you think the typewriter wins? Those printer follows toll present deponent it is even so. And even then tlicy come babbling, "New ribbon!"

Dear M.A.T., —Attracted the other night by *the birds of brilliant plumage milling round the Town Hall Concert Chamber I decided to speculate a bob—and a OFF HIS COURSE, good speculation it proved to be—oll Xocl Coward's satire "Easy Virtue." The audience—except for an outer fringe of the proletariat—was distinctly "highbrow," and the fur coats that were being "cloakroomed"' would—in the event [of a shortage—have bear-skinned a regiment of Grenadier Guards. Beauty, fashion and intellect, white shoulders, modern and striking coiffeurs, ravishing gowns, brilliant com" p.lexions and gallant escorts. Into the scintillating assembly drifted a grim-visaged stranger, a raven among birds of paradise" a man whose attire, complexion and bearing proclaimed him "ship's fireman" as surely as though he were labelled. Ho intrigued me. and I took the seat next to him/ This, I said to myself, knocks Eugene O'Xeill's "hairy ape" theory bandy. Here's a horny-handed son of Martha, one of the "Black' Squad," throws down his shovel and furnace slice and mingles with the elite to browse on the literary caviare of Coward. But he uttered 110 word and sat somnolent. About halfway through the second act he became restive, and I received a powerful nudge in the ribs and a hoarse whisper, "Oy. mate, wlien's Janice Hart cotiiin' on? I seen the show in London, but it was better than this. Warrer thev all gassin' about?" I whispered back, "You've missed the boat, old man. The Hart-O'Brian Company is at His Majesty's Theatre, further down the street. This is Noel Coward's play 'Easy \irtue.'" He made no answer and seemed for a few minutes more comatose than before, and then, clutching his cap and heaving himself out of his seat, he vanished into the night. But I'd like to have hoard his fo'e'sle version of it next morning.—J.B. THOUGHTS FOR TO-DAY. In quietness and in confidence shall be your strength.—lsaiah. Well apparelled April on the heel Of limping Winter treads. —Shakespeare. Most of our misfortunes are more supportable than the comments of our friends upon them. —C. C. Colton.