LAWN TENNIS (By "Huka.")

Evening Post, Volume XC, Issue 92, 16 October 1915, Page 12

LAWN TENNIS (By "Huka.")

THE THORNDON CLUB. The Thorndon Lawn Tennis Club held its annual meeting on Thursday night, when the annual report and balance-sheet was adopted. The year dosed with 99 playing members and 24 honorary members. Of the playing members 61 were ladies, the men's roll having suffered owing- to the number^ -who have gone to the war. Some thirteen soldiers ai© representatives of the Thorndon Club. During the season two championship and one handicap club events were played. Lees interest was taken in these events than usual, but probably the war caused that. R_. N. K. Swanston was the club champion, and_ Miss Williams the lady champion. Misses Seed and Batham won the handicap doubles event. The olub members did not play in many of the outside tournaments, and none of the prominent players entered for the New Zealand championships. R. N. K. Swanston won the Wellington provincal championship singles, and with J. Peacock the championship doubles. The year's working showed a profit of £58 10s 7d, which is in itself very satisfactory. The balancesheet showed that the club is in a very good condition as far as its finances are concerned, and it has a splendid property, worth possibly anything between £2000 and £2500— it is freehold. The members are to be congratulated upon having had such capable officers, whose foresight has placed them in possession of such splendid grounds. The late Mr. L. G. Mackay was one who for many years did invaluable work in connection with the club, and the committee and the cikub placed on record its regret at his death. Without doubt he was one of those workers who toiled without applause, and did splendid service in many ways quite unknown, to the club members. The courts, which _ are grass ones, are in splendid condition, and will play fast and true this summer. Intending members ehould make early application for membership. E. Salmond was elected hon. secretary after Whyte Parsons # resigned, owing to his removal to Chra6ichurch, and has everything in good trim for the new season. AT THE FRONT. Germot, the French tennis champion, has been wounded. While on sentry duty in the trenches, near Lingekopf, a fragment of shell struck him on the head, causing a serious wound. Stan. Doust, the well-known Sydney player, has gone abroad with the 23rd City of London Rod Cross. Prior to taking up this work he was a member' of the Fleet-street "Volunteers. A faulty big toe stopped him from getting to the front as an active fighter, but he was determined to do something, and now is working hard for the relief of the wounded. R. W. Heath, one of Australia's champion players, and a representative of Australasia in two Davis Cup contests, has gone to England with the idea of offering his services in the war to the Mother Country. He arrived in the latter part of August, and intends undergoing a course of training in aviation with -a view to joining the "fifth arm." Captain J. C. Parke, 6th Battalion, Leinster Regiment (this is Parke, the Irish champion, who came to New Zealand as a member of the British team, that lifted the Davis Cup, and it was he who defeated^ Brookes), was wounded in action in Gallipoli on 10th August, almost as soon as his battalion went into action. Shrapnel got him in the right wrist, but luckily the wound proved to be not very serious, though it has necessitated h\^ going into hospital. Parke landed on Gallipoli in July, but bis battalion was kept at the base until August. On 25th July he wrote saying: "We are still at the same "base, and_ have been carrying on with manoeuvres just sb if we were at home, and not within a few miles of the real thing. lam sitting at present in our company's mess reservation, which consists of a trench one and a-half feet deep by one foot wide, dug round in a circle of five feet diameter, leaving a mound in the middle to act as a table. The loose earth has been thrown up behind for a sort of lane-back, and yesterday afternoon we rigged up a. very so-so shade out of a tripod of long poles, two greatcoats, and two blankets, with the assistance of numerous nails and pieces of string. So farit has acted mainly as a fly-collector, for we seem to have millions of them here to-day It was absolutely airless when we woke up this morning, and so hot that I had to get up at 6.30. Since then it has been growing steadily hotter, until it is pretty near the limit now at noon, only fortunately a. tiny breeze has sprung up which makes it just bearable. The bathe in_ the evening about seven is the only thing- left to five for at the moment, and the thought that this can't last fox ever sustains us slightly The flies are really getting pretty bad now, and are into all oar food at ones. They have to be chased off every bite, and it is as well not to use butter and jam, on the same slice of bread or you are liable to ■ find a sandwich of flies in between. It's full moon now, and the whole place look* really love*y from 8 o'clock on, and in fact from 6.30 p.m. is the only time that counts. I couldn't finish this morning, as it was so confoundedly hot, and I'm just adding a few lines now after my bathe about seven.. It's almost cool, and the flies have ceased from troubling, and all is well sa-ve for the want of a chair to sit down on. At the moment I am sitting on the ground with my -legs stuck out straight, and scribbling on my knees. Just now the sun and moon are exactly opposite each other, and both just above the horizon. I have never seen them like_ that before, but perhaps it is a peculiarity here. There were sounds of heavy firing for a couple of hours last night, so there was probably something doing." Then about a fortnight later Parke saw action, and was wounded. IN AMERICA. Melville H. Long (now a doctor) reappeared after an absence of two years from tournament play, and showed fine form in the Panama Pacific Exposition Tournament. will be -remembered that ho and M'Loughlin were formerly America's two coming men, and about on a par. They formed the American Davis Cup team against Australia in 1909, and though beaten did exceptionally well.