HIS LITTLE JOKE.

Press, Volume LX, Issue 17989, 5 February 1924, Page 14

HIS LITTLE JOKE.

A VICTORIAN. VISITOR. BRIGHT CHAT ABOUT NEW ZEALAND. A contributor to the Melbourne '' Age'' who signs himsolf '' Ngaurukoe," gives with obvious enjoyment an amusing account of a recent visit to New Zealand. In the courso of it ho makes comparisons. I undertook more perilous tram rides than fall to tho lot of most men, and eamo through unscathed, ho says. Luna Park with its scenic railway was simply nothing to them. At Wellington you may rido on a cablo-tram up one of the steepest hills on earth, and if you are not blown off by tho wind or 'do not slide off over tho end, you get a magnificent view for your pains. All the tram services but this one are electric in Wellington. But in Dunedin there are four cable systems. Anyone in search of adventure need go no further than Dunedin. When the cable trams are not standing on their heads they are balancing themselves on their tails. One minute you are going straight to Heaven, tho next you are a dead certainty for the other place. When the city began to exist the authorities picked out the steepest hills and put tho cable trams there. Tho result is that grades of one in three and one in less than that are frequent. The effect has not been altogether satisfactory. So many thrills havo taken all tho ginger out of the Dunedinites, and apart from the trams the place is dull. In New Zealand the pedestrian traffic is supposed to keep to the left. Being a Melbourne man I kept to the right and got on splendidly. The rule' is best kept in Wellington, where it has only just been imposed. There are whit* lines down tho middle of the pavements to show you where to place vour feet. In Christchurch jou are supposed to keep to the left, but everybody keeps to the right. In Dunedin you" keep wherever you dashed well please. One hears a lot about windy Wellington in Australia. I went believing the report to be much exaggerated, and found it to be more than true. I never in my life- saw more unattached hats than "in Wellington. They leapt joyously from the heads of the people, soared about iu the air like small aeroplanes, and finally came- to rest on the top of a building or in the gutter. Most people went about with their hands to their hat's all the time, but a few of the canny ones declined the risk and carried their hats in their hands. After iosin."- four hats and three caps, I bou"-nt a small strap and buckled my hcauVear down. My appearance was no doubt eccentric, but tiie device was effective. Ac tho Bluff I nearly parted with niv head. An Antarctic gale was on the premises. It put its arms about me and tried to hurl me into the sea. Had it not been for a rail on the pier, ■ evidently placed there to prevent peo- | pie being blown into the water, I wou'd have drowned. As it was I had a pain in tho neck for days. The Bluff is the southernmost harbour of New Zealand. In point of latitude it is as far below Hobart as that city is below Melbourne. At the beginning of Januarv the weather was like the coldest winter weather of Melbourne. One memory of the Bluff I carried away with mo. In one of tho shorjs was a notice calling an urgent meeting of the Bluff Swimminn- Club. I really think it must have been a joke. The man who would g-j swimming at the Bluff would ask for boiling water in Hades. Of a!l the cities of New Zealand I liked Christchurch the best. ■ Christ-

church is flat, but it is well laid out, and contains many parks.and gardens. Wellington and Dunedin are more picturesque but not so- business-like.' "Wellington spends most of its time hanging on by its eyebrows. The houses built on the sides of its steep hills look as if a puff of wind would blow them over: Alany of them have three stories in the. front and only one at the back. From the harbour Wellington is a very beautiful city, with its steep, green hills, and its white r*d-roofed houses. The new House of Parliament is a handsome building in marble. Dunedin presents much the same sight. Port Lyttelton, the seaport of Christchurch, is built on even steeper hills. Auckland is the largest city of them all, but in comparison with the others it leaves me cold.

You can get the cheapest meal in the world in Wellington. You pay one shilling on the Kelburn cable tram, and that entitles you to a return fare and lunch at the Kiosk at the top of the hill. Since the return fare is sixpence, you get a hearty three-course meal for the other sixpence. All over New Zealand the cost of food is cheaper than in Australia.

I did not go to Rotorua or the geyser or earthquake country, and, strange to say, I experienced no earthquakes, but I saw the effects of one. Many years ago there was a tract of swamp in Wellington. One day an earthquake came along and lifted the swamp several feet. The place is now the Wellington cricket ground: I hope it remains so, but you never know. One mystery I was unable to" solve. I asked several Dunedinites about it, but none could tell me. I wanted to know why one of the Dunedin cable trams runs on the right hand side of the road, when all the others keep to the left. I asked politely, I asked truculently, I demanded to know, but not one Dunedinite could tell me. In the end I had to decide the matter for myself. When a Dunedinite slips off the end of a tram on a steep grade he likes to fall facing the) oncoming traffic. Then, how aoout tlije other systems which keep' to the left? I cannot say, but perhaps nobody falls off these. New Zealand provides a fine holiday trip, provided you have seen Victoria first.