RANDOM NOTES

Dominion, Volume 24, Issue 209, 1 June 1931, Page 8

RANDOM NOTES

Sidelights on Current Events local and general

Kickshaws.)

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When we were younger the wiseacres used to tell uf>: "I hate depriving you of this, but it Is for your good In the long run.” And that’s what the economists are saying now about the “cuts,” but we don’t like it any better now than we did then.

A lecturer on psychology says that a man who sways this way and that ■ never yet got anywhere. This is quite incorrect It is' a sure way of getting to the police station. * . • •

It is estimated that at ruling rates a railway trip to Mars would cost £3,000,000. This conclusive proof of the returns to be expected from the undertaking should encourage the Government tp build the line as soon as they have completed the South Island venture.

Regarding Friday’s paragraph on destiny, there are always two sides to a question. Here is the other side: — When one looks back on history it is obvious that the escapes of the great receive considerable publicity. But it is difficult to believe that providence really guards them more than anyone else. When the hands of a large clock checked the fall of the glass front of a timepiece above the Pope, his fortunate escape was cabled round the world. When a Newcastle commercial traveller performs, inadvertently, three consecutive somersaults in his car, and is only checked from falling over a precipice by a tussock of grass, his escape gets no further than half an inch in the local papers. When a Cheshire bridge Inspector falls off the Mersey Bridge, the third close shave in a few years, nobody calls him a man of destiny. Moreover, when a half-wit dies a natural death in spite of the fact that a German rifle bullet has been embedded in his heart for thirteen years, one suspects destiny of an astounding impartiality. *

Considerable surprise has been show about a document which P^portedI to contain the requirements made years ago, whereby a Hutt farmer paid £1 a year for the rent of 1000 acres of land. Only when a custom such as this has been softened by tradition does public envy change to pride. If this selfsame farmer’s ancestors paid their pound annually for the last three hundred years it would be featured in every guide book. * *

Nevertheless there are customs more surprising than the Hutt farmer s annual rental of one pound. The tenants of a certain tenement called The Forge,” in the County of Middlesex, England, to this day pay as rent six immense horseshoes and 61 nails. This rent has been paid religiously ever since the year 1235. Moreover, it is not exactlv known now for what the rent is paid. In the same manner the Duke of Wellington’s rent to his Majesty the King for the Strathfieldsay®' Estate takes the form of a little silken miniature French tricolour. The Duka of Marlborough pays exactly the same rent for his beautiful Blenheim Estate. The first Duke in each case must have felt sllghtlv ridiculous when he paid his rent. To-day it is an accepted custom that rarely gets into the papers. -«* ' •

A certain owner of a Shropshire estate pays his rent in a most unusual manner. It is his duty to supply the Royal bacon as rent, when the country Is at war. The Duke of Atholl discharges his rental duties for a piece or land bv banding a white rose to. the King. The Munros of Foulis. are obliged to mollify his Majesty’s desire for rent by presenting him, winter or summer, with a snowball whenever he pays them a visit. A landowner at Aylesbury is called upon to “furnish straw sufficient for the Royal bed" as part and parcel of. his duties for the land he owns. So these curious rents continue to this day. One man pays the King sufficient water for washing his hands; another has to blow three blasts of a bugle from Buckstone Rock, and the owner of Kidwelly Castle must furnish a knight in full armour at the will of the King. Even the Corporation of London has paid rent for the last 200, years in respect to a property in Shropshire, known as the “More," by ceremoniously chopping up faggots with a hatchet and billhook. This Is all the more remarkable because nobody has known for centuries the exact position in Shropshire of the property known as the "More.”

So identical were the qualifications of two elerks applying for a position under the Wellington Hospital Board that their names were written on two pieces of paper. The name first drawn out of a hat was taken to be the successful applicant There is never a day but thousands of decisions are settled by drawing lots, or the spin of a coin. At cricket, golf, billiards, football, in public bars, and on the race course the issue of the moment is settled by tossing. These are trivial matters that cannot be easily decided by any other means. Sometimes, however, important decisions are left to chance. President Roosevelt once adopted methods very similar to those used by the Wellington Hospital Board. Two senators' were unable to agree as to the disposal of their patronage for a number of vacant government jobs. The problem was put before Roosevelt. He suggested tossing. The first toss nominated a man for the post of Bank Examiner. Within an hour, the spinning of Roosevelt’s silver dollar had decided all the officers in South Dakota.

Even in the solemn purlieus of courts of law the homely spinning of a coin has solved many a vexed problem. In Sheffield, England, the question arose as to whether a husband should allow his wife 35s or 45s a week. The two solicitors became argumentative on the point. Eventually the judge persuaded both sides to toss. The solicitor representing the wife cried “heads” and an order for 45s a week was accordingly made. That was an Invocation to the goddess of chance in a court of law. Here is an invocation to luck to decide the apportionment of buried treasures in Mesopotamia. American and British explorers were working side by sule. In order to make an equitable division of their mutual finds the ownership of each object was decided by tossing. One stake was of such value that when the English archaeologist won it the Americans offered the whole of their share in the rest of the collection in exchange. It was not accepted. In the same manner when Cecil Rhodes first went to Oxford he tossed up to decide whether he should go to Balllol or Oriel. It seemed a trivial matter at the time. Oriel won. If Balliol had realised that by a mere spin of a coin Oriel was destined tv become richer by £lOO,OOO when Rhodes died, doubtless the toss would have assumed a dignified ceremony more befitting t<? the university authorities.