RANDOM NOTES

Dominion, Volume 26, Issue 48, 19 November 1932, Page 10

RANDOM NOTES

Sidelights on Current Events LOCAL AND GENERAL

(By

Kickshaws.)

A writer warns his readers to take care not to end their holidays on the wrong note. Usually one ends a holiday with no notes at all.

A dictionary of golf terms in ten languages is being compiled.. This should set a standard that all golfers will envy.

The Mayor 'of Wellington has warned the Reserves Committee not to over-spend its estimates. As it is, the trouble seems to be that the committee under estimates the over-spend.

Quotations published from begging letters received by the grocer in Auckland who won a substantial prize in the Irish Free State sweep throw some curious sidelights on human nature. Far from his experiences being exceptional, it is the common lot of all fortunate winners. One man who won the Calcutta sweep received a letter the next day that read: “Your success is built on wrecked hopes, ruined homes. You and your like are the curse of Hie nation. I sincerely hope that your tainted money will bring you the unhappiness it deserves. If you have £lOO to spare it would be appreciated.” Another winner of a big sweep received the following curious effusion: “Kind, Gent, Captain, Sir, You are my father and mother, and if you had not won we should have been brothers in misfortune. With a bellyful of hope I took a ticket but I am now reduced to a stone. The landlord was most rude to me this morning. What is a thousand pounds to your honour but ae ships which pass in the night? If you will mail me the money by return I will pray heartfeltfully for you.”

Some sweepstake winners have been sufficiently impressed with the frailties of mankind that they have been disposed to write advice for the benefit of future winners. “Many of your former friends,” one winner declares, “will change into pitiful beggars. In almost everyone of them jealousy will flame.” Another winner warns others who win sweepstake fortunes that it means the breaking off of nearly all one’s friendships. A difficult period of loneliness and calumny follows. The man who won £BO,OOO from Callboy in the Calcutta Sweep of 1927 says that he looked forward to a life of leisure, but after a year he was bored to distraction. “Those days,” he says, “were the most desperately unhappy times of my whole life. My old friends left me and an army of cadgers took their place.” Far from winning a sweep having the happy results expected of it all these letters of advice are tinged with sadness. Desire is never satisfied. “Keep your head, keep your work, and keep your money,” seems to be the wisest advice. It was given by the winner of the Calcutta Sweep in 1931.

The failure of the Leonid meteors to put'in an appearance at two in the morning was not entirely unexpected. Astronomers have been forced to admit that for the last few visits these vagabonds of space have shown an inexplicable fickleness. For perhaps a million million years these shooting stars faithfully returned regularly every 33 years. Their history can be traced back no less than a thousand years. In 1833 and 1866 the sky was ablaze with them. In 1899, however, astronomers were horrified to find that their pet swarm had vanished. Popular confidence in astronomical prediction was badly shaken. The problem for the astronomers was to explain what had happened to several thousand billion particles smaller than cricket balls careering through empty space. The planet Jupiter has been held to blame, but the mystery has never been solved. As if to make the plot more baffling there have been signs of the swarm’s return on several occasions. In the meantime other swarms are keeping to schedule. If you cannot see the Leonids there are still the Lyrids, the Aquarids and the Perseids.

But for the fact that the earth is protected by a covering of air at least 100 miles thick we would not be at all anxious for the return of the missing swarm of shooting stars called the Leonids. Their arrival would be ushered in by one of the worst bombardments imaginable. The human race would have to live in deep dug-outs until the stars had spent their fury. Most of these shooting stars are admittedly not more than cosmic dust little larger than a pea. It is their velocity, some twenty miles a second as compared to a bullet’s three-quar-ters of a mile a second, that gives them such destructive power.. The moment this star dust strikes the atmosphere the enormous friction generated heats it up to a temperature of 10,000 degrees. Something like 3000 horsepower radiated from a thing the size of a pea, as it is, gives one an idea what would happen to us if there were no atmosphere. Vagabonding between the empty spaces of the solar system for millions of years the meteor swarms are thought to be the debris of a catastrophic collision between the sun and another star.

An Archdeacon speaking at Christchurch was on controversial ground when he said a person who preferred D. H. Lawrence to Thackeray had a doubtful mind. In the matter of books we are all entitled to our own opinions. Moreover the opinions of posterity may be very different from our own. With the death of Tom Robertson the light of English playwriting must have seemed to be extinguished for ever. Yet to-day not many people know the name. In his day Pinero, Jones, Shaw, Wilde, Galsworthy, Barrie were boys at school. When one starts to study the matter it becomes apparent that there is no such thing as a modern writer of enduring fame. By the time that his stock rises sufficiently for his nnme to endure for all time he has ceased to be a modern writer. When Fielding died in 1754, who knew that his name would endure? Time had yet to supply an answer. It was fiftyeight years before another star entered the world whose writings would eclipse those of Fielding. On the day that Dickens departed Kipling was five years old, Wells four, and Bennett two years old. It is true that George Meredith had arrived. But strange to say his books, in spite of his greatness, are among the worst sellers! » * » For life is the mirror of king and slave, 'Tis just what we are and do; Then give to the world the best yoa have And the best will come back to you. —Madeline Bridges.