THE PASSING SHOW.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 207, 2 September 1936, Page 6

THE PASSING SHOW.

(By THE MAN ABOUT TOWN.)

"Nemo" sends a few figures relative to vital statistics: Population, 1,500,000; deduct those eligible for old age and other pensions, 375,000—1,125,000; deduct NEW ZEALAND, persons working for 1g 3 6. tlie Government Public Works, public servants, city and other governments and members of Parliament, 500,000—025,000; deduct those ineligible to work under child labour laws, 575,000—50,000; deduct unemployed, 40,998; remaining to produce the country's goods -2. Just you and me, and I'm getting tired.

It must be a queer tiling to go about feeling that you are the rightful heir to the throne of England and to rise on your soap box and tell Hyde Park PARK ORATORS, the same. The gentleman who was recently charged with breaking Hyde Park regulations may be own relative to the one who claimed to be an egg on toast. The Man Who Would Be King is mentioned here because London parks from time immemorial have been the battle ground of the preposters and with so little official interference that a long-haired soap boxer is usually considered the most harmless being. Bevolutionaries of the most whiskered description have repeatedly challenged the State, the Throne, the Government; have threatened to overthrow dynasties and other things that annoy them, while the policeman smiled indulgently and the crowd had half an hour of chuckle. Mind you, not all soapboxers are merely amusing—some mean it. There are -men in New Zealand who made no claim to royal birth from the box, but who have achieved higher eminence than the packing case of their novitiate to public life. And to them be the requisite adoration. They move slowly at Home—mainly because there is so much to move. That giant organisation, the British Post Office, tells the telephone snbTIM. scriber the time if the subscriber rings TIM. One could get the Auckland post office to tell the time once, but it dropped the service, probably because radio tells the time every few minutes. The London "Times" in a leader—that is, a tenth leader —facetiously regards Tim as a menace to sellers of watcfies and clocks. Since time-telling has been common in New Zealand watches and clocks seem to have increased in numbers. "The Times" says that many of us have no clocks, and more of ns have clocks that won't go—and some of ns have never learnt to tell the time. But it has a useful suggestion, too. If you may ring TIM and get the time, why cannot you ring DAT and receive the day of the week? One doesn't like this suggestion—are there no newspapers? Tho solemn print which is not always so solemn wants to know why one can't ring up the post office dialling LIM and be told a limerick —the possibilities are unlimited. Nice to know that Colonel J. E. Duigan, D.5.0., commanding this, the Northern New Zealand Command, is appointed an additional aide-de-camp to the King. A SOLDIER. Colonel Duigan, who is a cheery soul, is one of the relatively rare New Zealand professional soldiers —has been at it all his life from boyhood, has studied the science—is in fact of the invaluable class without which the amateur soldier regimented for war, is but as sounding brass and a tinkling symbo?. His familiars, of course, call him "Jack" —the cheeky devils! —and he doesn't mind. He has, of course, specialised military engineering and commanded that extraordinarily useful corps, the New Zealand Tunnelling Corps, in the Great War. He fleshed his maiden sword as a boy in South Africa, as good a school for officers as ever happened, with "Duffer's Drift" for a text book. Incidentally, Colonel Duigan took a staff course at Quetta, which was destroyed by earthquake. Mind you, his apparent youth is deceiving. He fought in the South African War, and that will tell you. It began in ISO!). One wonders if it isn't cheeky for a full private to congratulate an aide-de-camp to the King—but here's luck and chance it!

Here on the table lies a short length of small rope, the only available remnant of the rope that pulled tne alarm bell in Mafeking when Baden-Powell and A SCRAP his merry men were beOP ROPE, leaguered by the Boers in that funny little village. You remember, of course, that the Belief of Mafeking was regarded as an event of stupendous significance and that the Empire went mad with joy. One happened to be tailing on for rations far, far from Mafeking when Mafeking was set free. On the Quarter tent a scrap of paper was pinned. On it were the words, "Mafeking Believed." A soldier, scanning- it, said, "Where the hell is Mafeking?" and another replied, "Jiggered if I know" (or other suitable variation). At the moment the Empire was skying its accumulated hat and drinking all the beer the soldiers ought to have had. Well, then, later on troops marched on Mafeking again. New Zealand troops were of the force, and, if one remembers, rightly, the late General B. H. Davies, a New Zealand officer (who in the Great War had a command), commanded this force. With this force was Mr. J. F. Mackley, and this bit of rope belongs to him. As no one was alarmed, the alarm bell wasn't in use. There was no need for it, so Mr. Mackley cut it down and brought it home. One presumes that from time to time the rope has been given away in souvenir bits. The remnant seems as good as new and is one of the few interesting Mafeking relics Baden-Powell hasn't got.

Bold person, the Mayor of Wellington! Mr. Hislop declares that > T ew Zealand women cannot cook and told a meeting of women eo — injudicious, perhaps, but AN AUDACIOUS Mayors are Mayors and MAYOR. privileged. A man to be able to say that the worften of New Zealand cannot cook should have travelled from house to house throughout the land and taken a meal at each one — backblocks, frontblocks, suburbs, butshlands, farms, in houses where the income is thirty shillings a week, and in houses where the income is thirty pounds. He might find (and. most probably would) that the New Zealand woman not only lias a natural flair for cooking but knows better than most women what to do with tucker when she gets it. The Mayor of "Wellington is so extraordinarily wrong that refutation seems almost childish. One may gibe at the too frequent tin-opener, but not at the hundred thousand women who day by day fill the waistcoats of our superior selves and who haven't been dehumanised by the unskilled cooking of these women. Women (and girls who will be women in five minutes or so) are absolutely avid about cooking —there are ceaseless competitions everywhere. Exhibitions teexn with the work for stomachs. Women's institutes cook incessantly and cook like angels. The State teaches cooking to girls, laying the foundation for dear old pa's meals in the eweet by-and-by and the teachers who teach 'em can cook skilfully and might satisfy ev.en the Mayor of Wellington if he were satisfiable. Mr. Hislop, the gallant Mayor of Wellington, tells women what he thinks of the cooking.of the women of New Zealand. The women of New Zealand might tell him wlia t they think of the Mayor of Wellington.