A NAVAL YARN.

Press, Volume LX, Issue 18243, 29 November 1924, Page 11

A NAVAL YARN.

LORD JBLLICOE*S LAST SIGNAL. (arscMi. to "ih» vxa&s.") WELLINGTON, November 23. It is reported (says "T.D.H." in the '•'Dominion") that Lord jellicoo's farewell signal in Cook Strait .to. Nex- Zealand's Navy is one that caused many chuckles aboard H.M.S. Dunedin. Engineer-Commanders in the Navy are required by a hard-hoarted -Admiralty to keep strict account of all their stores (which 6C©m to" include everything anybody wants aboard ship) and the result is that they are apt to become stony-hearted in turn, or to bo 6,-> regarded by other people who want a little extra "paint to smarten a ship or to replace some article dropped into "the ditch" without having their pay docked for it~. r . .

It seems that one probably baseless allegation by the disgruntled against the Engineer-Commander of the Dunedin is that he .slows the engines down at sea to save fuel, and. «'TJ).H." is informed that when Lord JclKcoo paid his final'visit'to, our. flagship he laughed heartily at a drawing which had been chalked up by an audacious was*". The picture showed an engine-room rating reporting to the Engineer-Comman-der that the ship had heeirslowed down to eight knots, and. Father Neptune putting his head up over the stern and saying, "Get- a move on or I'll arrest you for loitering on tho high^seaa." It is said that the artist, who had been expecting a summons To appear on the quarterdeck-among the "captain's, defaulters." became qnite a popular hero when Lord Jellicoe's last farewell signal was received from the Tahiti: "Good-bye. "'Don't get' arrested for loitering on 'the high : seas."

The following note by Eugene Field will be read with interest by:many'old and youthful sinners:— It is really interesting to study the ingenuity devised and practised by many men in smuggling contraband literature into their .libraries. One of my acquaintances went to the trouble and expense of having Balrac's "Cohtes Drolatiques" bound like his Macaulay's "History of England." • He numbered i» Volume IV., and threw away the real fourth volume. Another friend has hia Rabelais bound in a dull shade and entitled "Batter's "Saints' Best." 'And a volume of as lively old English ballads .as. we ever read wo discovered on the shelf of a second-hand bookstore disguised as "Memoirs of the Be v. John Tejdd."