A LITTLE VERSE

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 124, 29 May 1933, Page 8

A LITTLE VERSE

DRAWINGS AND CARVINGS

SUPREME COURT BUILDING

The urge to draw with a. pencil and carve with a pocket-knife is part of the make-up of )most boys, and usually in the execution of this work scant thought is paid to tho disfiguring effect on the objects of their attention. The habit, usually developed in school days, is exercised on tho desks in the class rooms, surreptitiously, of course, because that is half the- joy of the pastime, if pastime it can be called. But with most .boys, tho desire to cut. into things or scratch on them with pen or poncil departs as soon as they leave school. There arc exceptions, however, for in some places oldish "boys" carry on. Possibly tho temptation has been too; great or circumstances, perhaps, have been all compelling. Examples of the work of tho older school are to be found in tho Supreme Court building, not only on the walls of the. cells, but also, sad to relate, on an old Press bench. Under the power, of several electric lights,, the cheerless, cells below tho floor in the Supreme Court building reveal many secrets and the mind is flooded with memories of many big' trials. Periodically tho cells arc given, a. coat of whitewash, but so deeply have some prisoners cut their names into the walls that mere whitewashing cannot obliterate them. Although the walls at the present time contain relatively little evidence of the hundreds of men that have passed through the cells, the names of at least two who paid the extreme penalty of the law are to be seen. Thcro arc drawings on the heavy wooden doors, howcyer, and the doors show that occasionally a prisoner also has been moved to break into verse. This is- an example, apparently the work of. a thirsty .individual: — If1 the sea was beer, , And I was a duck, I'd dive to the bottom And never come up. : ' The rhyming is not sound, but doubtless the perpetrator .felt that the lines gave some expression to his inner feelings. , . Cut into .the olcLPress desk arc the. initials, and in some cases the uamns", of upwards of fifty journalists. Some ' of the men whose initials and names appear on the desk occupy leading positions in New Zealand journalism today. Others who have loft their marks on the desk are travelling the .inky way ; overseas, and there are names and initials of men who are no more.. In one case there are the names of both father and son. There is one piece of verse on this old desk in which use is made of legal terms. It runs as follows: — Fee simple and the simple fee, And all tho fees en tail, : Cannot be compared with thee, Thou best of fees female. And yet the oM maxim says, "The npn is michtier than tho sword."