BY THE WAY

Evening Star, Issue 20256, 17 August 1929, Page 2

BY THE WAY

[By Q.V.3 14 Th« time has comt*, 1 ’ the Walrus laid, 41 To talk ol many things/* i ■ i I One of the ■ most optimistic state- ' merits we have heard tor a long tune was made by _Mr Scollay at the fateful mooting of the Harbour Board this week, when it was decided to concentrate on making Dunedin a deep-sea port, and to leave Port Chalmers to its fate. Mi Scollay said, among other things, that ‘‘Some time .in the future Otago would be practically a free port.” The picture of an innocent flock of imI porters, exporters, and shipowners, frisking, in the same enclosure as a I benevolent / Harbour Board Uon which ’ had turned vegetarian, touched us al- ; most to tears, but not quite. Some i people never know when to let well | alone. Here we are, getting along not . so badly. The new dredge is understood to be rushing out from Home at 1 her best speed, say, three knots. Wo 1 have not read a leading article headed | ‘ Barrabas and the Harbour Board—A , Parallel,’ for a long time, and here ! comes Mr Scollay upsetting . everybody 1 with his talk about free ports. However, the prophecy is not so daring as it appears on the surface. “Sometime in the future ”is fairly vague. According to scientists, sometime in the future Otago Harbour, and even Dunedin itself, that , mighty city, will be buried I under hundreds of feet of ice, and ' probably the only inhabitants, if any, will be a few hardy Scots from the freezing works trying to develop a trade in sealskins and whale steaks with Africa. When that day comes Otago Harbour will, no doubt, be free enough. There will not be much in the shape 01 I goods on . which to levy dues. A few leases of tobacco and whisky will suffice I for the simple needs of the importers. Tha whale meat trade will take a lot ' of working up before it amounts to any- ; thing, and probably the ship hcrscll will tie up to some handy icefloe, perhaps twenty miles out, and pay her dues “ with the topsail sheet.” Even so Mr Scollay does not say that Otago 1 ; will be an absolutely free port, but only practically so. There may be a good deal of discussion as to the pro- • cisc meaning of the word “ practically ” before matters are finally • stabilised. I * . * » • i [ While we have ’varsity-trained law- ’ yers, the United States—or at least the Chicago part of it—believes in academic detectives. Perhaps we shall r come to it some day in New Zealand. E t 1 wandered by the 'Varsity [ (The glory of our town), , And there 1 saw a student chap I A-sti oiling up and down. I Ho smoked a large and hefty pipe; I Ho wore a dressing gown. > He ran his fingers through the hair That thatched his mighty brainy And then be used upon his wrist, As though to cause some pain, . A little hypodermic squirt, . Which seemed to hold cocaine. ! “0 foolish student,” I began, ' These antics 1 deploic. J Is this the morning that succeeds The hectic night before? . Did ’Varsity boat Kaikorai, . And can vou tell the score?

Are you a sl'udent of the Mines, Who burrows underneath? Or seek you curing human ills, Oi drawing human teeth? And wherefore do you wander thus Beside the River Leith? “My dear old Watson,” he replied, Your eyes are not too quick. 1 bear no stethoscope; you see No forceps, and no pick. And ’Varsity—thirteen to nil — Achieved the winning trick. But if you’re keen on knowing why I ruffle up my hair, And smoke this pipe, and use this squirt Dpon my arm. and wear This unaccustomed dressing gown (Which badly needs repair), It’s not that I’m rehearsing for A local pantomime, i\or following a slovenly Device for killing time. I’m on a course of study for The putting down of Crime. The fire-bug, and the burglar, too, The Jipld-np and the crook, The forger and the murderer, Will all be brought to book. There's not a single criminal That I shall overlook. And in our first-year course, we don’t Peruse gigantic tomes. We cultivate the “ atmosphere,” And everyone who comes Must imitate the manner and' Tho dress of Sherlock Holmes, Arsone Lupin and Father Brown Are useful models, too; We wear their costumes now and then. And, if you’re lucky, you Might see me in a black “ Soutane ” At work upon a clue. And in the long vacation we Are busy in tho gaol. We interview the prisoners, And listen to each tale. ■ Psychology succeeds, of course, When other methods fail. No longer will detectives’ jobs. As heretofore, be filled By some promoted Johnny Hop Of large and massive build. Detection is a science, and Must occupy the skilled. America has given us (As usual) the lead. Of course, the problem, in her case, Is very big, indeed. B”t still our crime is growing, and We’re bound to feel the need. T marvelled, and departed thence, To meditate at ease, the horrid fate of those Who practise villainies, When tracked by scientific sleuths So highly Trained as these. I think the time is bound to come When criminals, perforce, j Will save their trade by taking up t The desperate resource Of making crime the subject of A correspondence course! * 9f Some of the pronhets who dip into the future, far as human eye can see and note the rumptv-tumpty, Tunintytumpty tumpty tee, assure us with conviction that The economic centre of the world is sliding over to the Antipodes, though whether hy the Red Sea route or via Panama is unstated. They maintain that tlm British Parliament might as well shift to Canberra, or even Wellington, now and have done with it. This is good news for tho politicians. Sir Joseph Ward, for example, ought to revise his borrowing piogramrno forthwith. What is a mere seventy million pounds, spread, moreover, over a term of years, to a world centre? Wo ought to go seven hundred at leas*. What do we think of it ourselves? We don’t know anything about the matter at all. We have seen the

mellow, summer day of great Victoria’s reign go down in a gorgeous sunset. Wo heard the first sighing of the winds among the,vines in the days of Edward the Peacemaker. We have witnessed the tempest .which broke in 1914, and we are still battling along in the wintry bleakness of the present. Wo have seen too many changes to be astounded at anything which may turn up. All we are sure of is that, whatever may come, the average man will have to work hard for not undue,reward, and will yet find life interesting enough and sweet enough to cling to it.

The Rhine may be a lovely stream, And ever so romantic;, But. in the winter, it would .seem, Tho cold is simply frantic. And those unlucky French “ poilus,” They sit and shiver in their shoes. “Mon Dieu, Tonnerre!” They loudly swear; “The cold is simply frantic!”

Briand is moved and sheds a tear; Ho hates to see them suffer, And says to St." D semann; “Look here. You obstinate old duffer, Do you by 'any chance suppose Our regiments are Eskimos? You’re glad they freeze And cough and sneeze. You nasty bard old buffer!’’

Says Stresemann: “We don’t compel Your troops to stay and shiver; Just let them leave and go to —well, A somewhat warmer river. I shouldn’t grieve to see them fix . Their winter quarters on the Styx, Provided they Depart to-day. And seek a warmer river.

Does anyone remember the months immediately before the late Government went into the shipping trade? The letters to the papers, the impassioned speeches explaining that the supply of tropical and sub-tropical fruit to" the people of the dominion was far too important a matter to be_ left in the hands of private enterprise, the references to vitamin A, and the amount of sunshine packed away in oranges. Oranges, which should be a staple article of diet, were luxuries for the rich alone, because their transport was in the hands of men who regarded steamers as mere dividend-earning machines, and not as essential agents in the building up of a race of supermen in tho south. Such a state of things was not to be thought of for a moment by any Government which had any regard for the corpora sano. * So tho Government got to work and ordered a steamer of its own to break down the cruel and soulless monopoly. Tho steamer was built and paid for, probably out of some loan or other, and in the fullness of time began the beneficient work of carting fruit across the Pacific. Tho other night as we wandered round the environs of pur suburb. we saw some oranges in a shop, and were straightway seized with a desire for the succulent fruit. We, however, spied a ticket reading “Fine Island Oranges, 4d each”—not a dozen, mind you, hut 4d each. Our last purchase had been in Salisbury, where the finest Jaffa fruit was retailed at 2d each The distance from Jaffa to England is, we suppose, about the same as that traversed by the Government vessel trading in the Pacific, only in England they have not the great blessing of Government carriage. We mentioned the matter to Mrs Q.V., who merely said: “We cannot afford oranges at 4d each,” and there the matter remained. The next development will probably be that the present Government will start to grow oranges, pnd the price will advance to Is 4d each. Luckily some of our neighbours have apple trees and do not keep a dog. When Snowden was biting, sarcastic, and cruel, And Cheron worked up to a terrible state. Things looked like an old-fashioned story book duel, A meeting with “ coffee and pistols at eight.” The seconds arrived to demand satisfaction. And Snowden at first stood as firm as a mule, But soon volunteered a sufficient retraction ’ To make the excitable Frenchmen grow cool. Still things without doubt were uncommonly heated; The conference might have been hoisted sky-high ; For Philip he swore that we mustn’t he cheated, And feathers and fur were beginning to fly. A tempest was brewing which looked like a snorter, And things wore as mixed as my metaphors are. When Henderson oiled the tempestuous water, And what was a scuffle became a mere spar.

It wasn’t a great and impassioned ora- ' tion; Flo didn’t implore them to kiss and be friends. But merely reminded the great convocation That squabbles like these were not serving their ends. “We’re not making progress,” he ventured to tell them, Which same w-ps a most’ platitudinous truth, But when quarrels rise and you want to dispel them, A platitude has such a ,-powqy to soothe!