WITHOUT PREJUDICE

Dominion, Volume 19, Issue 57, 29 November 1924, Page 6

WITHOUT PREJUDICE

NOTES AT RANDOM

(By

T.D.H.)

A theory is put forward that Tutankhamen' is identical with Joseph of the Bible. —It should be a change for the Shakespeare-Bacon people to get on to this. It does not appear whether the , Maori claim against the State for £350.000 for the South Island is based on the past, present, or prospective value of that portion of the Dominion, or whether it iepresents the amount of money the Maoris expected to make out of the land if the white man had. never come. Many readers of this column who recall the old “Badminton Library” of sporting reference books will regret to note in the news to-day the death of that veteran sportsman the Duke of Beaufort, the originator and chief promoter of the “Badminton Library.” Badminton, in Gloucestershire, not far away from the. Severn Tunnel, is the chief seat of the Dukes of Beaufort, .and besides having this famous collection of sporting books named after it, has also given its name to a drink and a game. The drink was a claret cup favoured by tho now deceased Duke, and was made of claret, sugar, spices, soda-water, and ice. Blood, which sometimes figures in pugilistic parlance as “claret,” also used to get into the sporting journals in the guise of “badminton” in the days when the sporting Duke of Beaufort’s claret cup was a popular drink”. The game of Badminton, which resembles lawn tennis, but is played with shuttlecocks instead of balls, irai first introduced in England about 18/3, and appears to have been popularised by the Duke of Beaufort. Like polo, it is a game which originated in India, and Badminton enthusiasts assert that it requires more staying power than lawn tennis does. Badminton House, whence ail these thipgs take their name, is an imposing mansion in the Palladian style, built iu 1782, and containing many splendid paintings and much fine wood-carving. It stands in the midst of a park, no less than # ten miles in circumference, but considerable as this is it represents only . a small slice of the 56,000 acres which the Duke of Beaufort owned. The Beaufort family is descended from John of Gaunt and Catherine Swynford, a lady whom he overlooked marrying for a number of years, and on whose offspring he bestowed the name of one of his castles in Anjou. The children were subsequently declared legitimate, but Henry IV laid it down that although of royal blood they were incapable of succeeding to the throne.

A wealthy Liverpool manufacturer surprised his chauffeur by bequeathing him his motor-car and £lO,OOO. —We gathered from a recent famous transaction that a free gift of a motor-car was of no use unless one got .an endowment of £30,000 along with it. “JO.” writes to say that when petrol gives out twenty years hence, as prophesied recently bv the pessimistic Sir George Knibbs we may supersede it with a still cheaper . motor fuel. “There is,” .he writes, “an element possessed of far greater potential power than petrol. The foundation of all explosives is nitrogen, which is one of most abundant in nature, being no less than 78 -per cent.. of the air we breathe, and amoun ting to 20,000,000 tons over every square mile of the earth’s surface. Hitherto this element, in spite of its abundance, has been most elusive to capture. Scientists are at present trying to evolve a percussion nitrogen motor. If such should be achieved, the whole question of motor traction may be revolutionised and the nitrogen syndicate recently formed for extracting mtrogen frorn the air at Milford bound for the manufacture of fertilisers may some day find it more profitable to cater for the propulsion of motor cars.”—Hany people will think it bad enough to have the. motor-cars monopolising the roads without having them using up all the air to run their beastly contraptions. Wellington College’s jubilee celebrations this week-end remind us that in our day there we saw quite a lot of the college, much more than the average, for we usually put in an extra hour every other afternoon in the detention room. . One day a stern parental finger directed our attention to an item m the remarks part of the term report: “This boy does no work and spends far too much time in detention.” What had we to say for ourselves? We had learned to accept the detention with more or less equanimity, but we thought the world was down on us to have it rubbed in at both ends. “Well, father,” we replied, “we’re the ones that ought to complain; not you. .You ought to be pleased, you’re getting all the more for your money.” , . . Father unfortunately didn t look at it this way.

The new names bestowed on certain parts of the landscape. around Lake AVanaka in commemoration . of Hear Admiral Sir Reginald T)rrwhitt and the Harwich naval force of the Great A\ ar have got there easily enough by simple Gazette proclamation. In Britain changing a place-name is not so easy. An unfortunate town of Bugsworth has been trying for years without avail to convince the authorities that it really ought to bo Bucksworth or Boxworth, but of its prayers, petitions, and appeals nobody takes the least notice and the railways and the post office refuse to disguise the «„ ” PokesdoWn, Bournemouth, also thinks it would be much more attractive as “Puck’s Down, but it looks as if it will have to keep on thinking. A confirmed bachelor likes to pay » woman compliments but he wont risk having to pay her bills. The new doctor, fresh from the medical school, called to «e 0 a very old patient, who immediately began to relate to him his various ailments, worst of all doctor. Pm afraid I> V e got a diseased liea . r , t ’ , hc , Y.jJf “Oh no,” said the doctor, “it’s not quite so bad as that, I’m S urc » But the old man held up a Xncinw finger, and said: “Excuse mt doctor, but it’s not for a young Sail like you to contradict an experienced invalid like moTO AN UNKNOWN ANCESTOR. My gifts have come to me far down I of huntsmen of old Theorem of timid virtue and of • crime . Offspring of sluggards and of Inheritor of juggled hopes and fears. Some gave me purity, some save the grime Of damaged souls. Some of them helped mv climb , Toward God. From some came smile*, from others tears. Oh I am cluttered up with legacies Long lines of jumbled blood have handed down; Yet I thank God upon my bended knees For him who, whether king or bawdy clown, , ~ By making sympathy his conscious art, g Hq one a tiled tho of kindness to my —S’- Mo&s?.