THE PASSING SHOW.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 280, 26 November 1938, Page 8

THE PASSING SHOW.

VERY THOUGHTFUL. A gang of chicken thieves operating about Everton, Missouri, invariably left behind a hen and a rooster c at each place they raided, together with the following note: We steal from the rich. We steal from the poor. We leave this Dair So you can raise some more. —JOHNNY. Wonder what's keeping the boss? The chair is here; so are the shears and the sack. He said he'd cut my hair before milking time. Probably he's feeding the THE BARBER. pigs. Ah. here he is.

Resourceful fellows. the<-e farmers. There's nothing they can't do. Well, I suppose he wants to get on with the job. Better untie the bun. Yes. it. is rather long, isn't it? Wish the fringes of the sack wouldn't, caress my neck so. Still. that's nothing. Talking will keep my mind off it. Must ask the boss "why he keeps the picture of Boris Karloff over the kitchen door. My word, that was a bloomer. Fancy it being his wife. He's certainly using those shears now. Must be almost finished. Still, there isn't much hair on the floor. Better fix the sack around my neck again. It's worked itself into a bunch down my hack, between my shirt and my skill. Good Lord, it's not the sack at all— it's hair. Ah, well, I'll be able to dispense with a mattress to-night, anyway. What, finished? That was a quick job. My head feels about ten pounds lighter. I can feel the •breeze caressing my scalp. Must go and have a look in the mirror. Ah. well, I won't l>e going to town for the next four "weeks, anyway. I suppose a fellow can keep his hat on until then.—Tuan.

A traffic cop "who took a man out for a road test for a car driver's" license suddenly told him to turn right without going round the "poached egg." The NOT IF MOTHER— man did. That, of course. is against the law, and the cop siiapj>ed. '"What you make that turn for?" ou told me to," said the man nervously. "Would you turn right without going round the 'silent j>oliceman' if your mother or your wife told you to?" asked the cop. The flustered fellow hesitated and then said, "Not if my mother told me to, no."—Johnny.

The average citizen is not well versed in law court procedure, although occasionally there appears a man who, through constant

association with the FREDERICK (tolice, becomes really THE GREAT, at home in such pi aces. One old "lag." in fact, gave a pretty demonstration of this sort of I thing. As a constable was hauling him into the station he called out "Shop!" On the other (hand, many people have a horror of appearing in ( ourt—even in the capacity of witnesses. Wednesday's traffic cases at the Magistrate's Court often provide something amusing in the way of procedure. One defendant, when charged with some minor offence—parking his car for over ten minutes or some 'such triviality astounded the Bench by saving, "I elect to be dealt with summarily, your Honor. During a lengthy and somewhat rambling statement he was interrupted by his Worship, "Do you plead guilty or not guilty?" The defendant scratched his head for a moment and then said frankly, "Well, your Honor, what do von think I should do? You've had more experience in this sort of thing than I have. It's my first time up." By the way, it is by no means unusual to hear a magistrate addressed as "Your Honor." Even "My Lord" is occasionally heard. Mr. F. K. Hunt. I think, hold* the record in these term® of humble deference, for one day ft prisoner addressed him as "Your Majesty." All said and done, he was worthy of the term.—B.C.H.

It is not from the cigarettes that people smoke that tobacco trusts make huge fortunes; the profit is in the portions of "fags" thrown away. In this respect FORTUNES women are the worst IN "FAGS." offenders. You will find all the evidence vou reqtiire that this is so by looking in the ashtray 011 the table of any restaurant after a party of women smokers have left. Probablv that is why you rarely see nicotine stains on the finger ti|>s of the fair ones. The various brands of tobaccos on the market must run into hundreds, that is. if we accept the labels, and. strangely enough, nearly every country has a different range of smokes. One man to make a large fortune and make it quickly was a Japanese named Murai. He was a patient in hospital in Kobe and was lying in bed smoking one morning when Or. John C. Berry made his rounds. The doctor, observing the young man smoking, left with him a pamphlet showing the evils of smoking. Young Murai was so impressed with the figures" in the pamphlet showing the number of educational institutions which could have been built with the money spent on cigarettes in Europe that he introduced the ciprarette to Japan. He made a large fortune before selling out to the tobacco trust.—Johnny. There has probably been more words printed about Captain Kidd, "the pirate bold," than any other seaman who ever sailed the s*as—and more misstateTHE TREASURE, ments. In a musty old volume published over two centuries ago I came across the original ballad which was written upon his death. It is a. typical specimen of doggerel versification, but it has one merit—there is more truth wrapped up in its hundred stanzas than in the multitudinous tomes written about the brave old buccaneer. Tt is a mournful old ballad and concludes with an invitation to "Come, all you young and old, see me die, see me die, come, all you young and old. see me die; come, all you young and old, you're welcome to my gold, for by it I've lost my soul, and must die." Yes. it's a "Prisoner's Song." all right: "To Newgate now I'm cast, and must die, and must die; to Newgate now I'm cast, artd must die; to Newgate now I'm cast, with a sad and heavy heart, to receive my just desert: I ir.ust die." It's a case of "So long" to the old pirate this time. "To Execution Dock I must go, I must go; to Execution Dock I must po: to Execution Dock will many a thousand flock, but I must bear the shock: I must die." And to Execution Dock at Wappinu they took Kidd (after a marathon trial), and. although the gallows collapsed when they were half way through the ceremony, they had a second hang at him and managed it.* In the interval, when Kidd lay half-hanged on the ground, the prison chaplain hopped in and asked him now that he was half way to , didn't he think it was time to "come clean" and give him the truth? History says the chaplain was gathering material for a book on the subject, and felt that this last gallows touch would make a glorious finish to his volume. And so, on May 23, 1701. died Captain William Kidd. the brave old Scotsman whose buried treasure is still searched for—and can't be found. But it was found, it's said, and it made a German Jew immigrant to America fabulously rich, as well as "Landlord of New j York," and bought an English peerage and ! (later) a viscountcv for the immigrant's ; grandson.—MaoClure. J