WITHOUT PREJUDICE

Dominion, Volume 18, Issue 256, 24 July 1924, Page 6

WITHOUT PREJUDICE

NOTES AT RANDOM

(By

T.D.H.)

Now that world peace, has been imperilled by the Olympic Games, Cabinet ought to consider whether the unity of the Empire will be imperilled by the All Black tour.

Major Fitzurse declares that it will not, as the Englishman never knows when ho is beaten.

Baking powder manufacturers are becoming alarmed at the mysterious way flour is rising in Britain.

People who declare that the world is getting worse instead of better may find a text for their grousing in the fact that, whereas the ancient Olympic Games continued for a thousand years, tho modern ones threaten to end in a, row after thirty years. The ancient games were, of course, a bigger event in their way, as the public had not the totalisator and the higher forms of sport to divert their attention. Even the calendar was kept in Olympiads until the fourth century after Christ; all wars had to cease in Greece during the period of the games; and triremes and galleys ran at excursion rates from all the'Greek islands in the Mediterranean bringing competitors and spectators from all parts. Immense crowds assembled, and modern research shows that there were at least twenty-four rows of scats around the stadium "While the young men contested in the athletic, events, the greybeard statesmen came also to look on. and to hold a sort of League of Nations gathering and make the world safe for democracy or whatever it was that happened to be the latest thing in politics.

It was the, wonderful Delphic Oracle which bade the Greeks hold the games, so tradition asserts, but the records of the early events organised by the late Messrs. Iphitus of Elis and Lycurgus of Sparta were lost in a fire in the pavilion or some such disaster. The detailed records only date back to 776 B.C. The Ancient Greeks at one period of their history seem to have been a cross between beings and grasshoppers, for in hjs record long jump Phayllus cleared" 55 feet, anil the average jump was 50 feet, whereas the degenerate modern only manages half that. Naturally these remarkable athletes were the objects of universal adulation. If they happened to be wealthy poets of the highest eminence sang their praises at so many drachmas per line (cash in advance), and similarly the greatest sculptors were prepared to do their pictures in marble in those immortal works now preserved in theiworld’s museums. In the early days of the Olympic Games all winners got was a laurel wreath, but as time went on they lived on public banquets for about a year after the games, received a perpetual exemption from taxes, and a pension for old age. The games., it is true, degenerated when professionalism set in in earnest and athletes were trained at the State expense for ten months in advance. Some of the old philosophers in their writings complain of the towns being full of these noisy roysterers, but this mar have been mere cantankerousness, and the probability is that the Greek philosophers were not able to practice the philosophy they preached any more than modern philosophers are able to refrain from throwing the bacon and eggs at their wives at times.

It was the Emperor Theodosius, in A.D. 393. who abolished the first series of Olympic Games, and it was Baron Pierre de .Coubertin, of France, who started the second series in 1894. At least, it was the Baron,who had the big idea. That the project came to anything was really due to a wealthy Greek citizen of Alexandria, one M. Averoph, who restored the stadium at Athens—despite all the excavation, tho actual Olympia Stadium was found te be too far gone for any sort of restoration. The result was that the first series was held at Athens in 1896. The next games were at Paris in 1900 during the great exhibition, with no British team. In 1904 the games were held in the United States in conjunction with the St. Louis exposition, and America won 24 out of 26 events, no English team bqine present. A return to Athens followed in 1906, when a reorganisation of dates and control took place, with the result that London had the games in 1908. Stockholm in 1912. and Antwerp in 1920. After the 1912 games the American papers declared tho British were poor losers, and tho British newspapers said the Americans were poor winners. After Antwerp everybody voted the show a failure and France and the United States grumbled a lot. It has been left for the 1924 games, however, to become a danger to the peace of the world.

Should women be made eligible for appointment as J.P.’s?—Dr. Bumpus thinks they should, as there ought to be some consolalion prize for the ones that want to be M.P.’s and can’t get in.

A little while ano I wrote about famous hoaxes, and “R” sends mo a naraoranh from the “Cumulative Bonk Index” about a envious book fraud:— “A remarkable literary forgery is exposed by the republication of ‘The Memoirs of Li Hung Chang.’ In 1913 ths book was issued, as . the bona fide memoirs of the Chinese statesman, with an introduction by the late John W. Foster, who had been Secretary of State in 1892-93 and had been associated with Li Hung Chang during the peace negotiations with Japan. After the book’s publication certain errors were pointed out which caused an investigation. After a laborious search it was determined that the ‘Memoirs’ were not fact, hut fiction, woven from whole cloth with a skill so extraordinary as to have deceived the elect'. Tim alleged edittor. William Francis Mannix. had written the book while serving a year’s sentence for foreerv in Honolulu. A vagabond newspaper man. broken in health and fortune, he had achieved a masterpiece of literary forgery.”

“K” writes: “As Captain Gypsy Smith is to travel to Britain in the same vessel with the All Blacks, they should be well coached in tho conversion of tries.”

A tale of four very little boys talking about their fathers is told bv the “London Morning Post.” The son of a writer said: “Mv father just writes a few words on a piece of paper and nets five pounds for it.” “Oh.” said the solicitor’s son. “mv daddie iust sits in a room and tells people what to do. and +hev give him ten pounds for it.” “That’s nothing,” said the parson’s son. “Mv dad gets vp in the pulnit. preaches for a few minutes, and when he’s finished it takes eight men to carry his money to the vestry.” “AH, WASTEFUL WOMAN.” Ah. wasteful woman, she who may On her sweet self set her own price. Knowing man cannot choose but nay, How has she cheapen’d Paradiso; How given for nought her priceless gift. How spnil’d the bread and spill’d the wine. Which, e-'opt with due respective thrift. Had made brutes men and men divine. —Coventry Patmore.