By the Way

Evening Star, Issue 23527, 16 March 1940, Page 3

By the Way

(By X.Y.)

AVhat’s up with Adolf? Does he grow old? Is it his liver ? Is it a cold? Is it an aching Tummy or toe? Why is ho making Such a poor show? Mostly they see him Flourish his arm, Stab his left finger In his right palm; Grab at his forehead, Throw his hand wide Loosing the torrid Notions inside. Folks who have heard him Witness that he Speaks for an hour or Two—even three. Now it’s a quarter—- . Not a tick more. Has the man caught a Cramp in his jaw? Previous orations Mostly have hurled Wrath and defiance Over the world; Slaughter and bombing, Famine and flame— Why, he’s becoming Stodgily tame! Sure we had looked for Some frightful thing; News of a Blitzkrieg Some time next spring; Bombs oyer Britain, Gas and disease, Till she is smitten Down on her knees. After we’d looked for Thrills and all that, Everything seems so Vapid and flat; Fussy and fretful, Pettish arid peeved, Pained and regretful, . Hurt and aggrieved. Something’s the matter, Something indeed. I think the Fuhrer’s Running to seed. All this is showing (That’s what I say) Signs of a growing Senile decay. True, he is fifty— Still pretty young; But if a fellow Keeps himself strung Up to a sound too High to maintain, Something is bound to Bust up his. brain. Somehow or other (I’ve got a hunch) Adolf is slipping, Losing his punch. Soon he’ll got muddled, Then' he’ll retire Horae, to sit huddled Over the firel • « • •

It is no exaggeration to say that the people of New Zealand are indebted to the fishermen of Otago for a brave stand, even if it should prove abortive —which we sincerely hope will hot be the case. Man does not live by fish alone. He yet prizes his freedom and his individuality, despite the craze for regimentation with which most Governments to-day plague their heavilytaXed subjects. The Otago fishermen (Moeraki perhaps excepted) put Up a fight on two fronts—against monopoly, and against dragooning by unrelated trade union officialdom pulling the strings of administration _ with the dumb acquiescence of a supine Government which had at first sought to evade responsibility by the old device of a Commission of Inquiry. The final issue is as yet uncertain. Dunedin is to have the unexpected honour of entertaining Mr Picot for a brief space. The name has a foreign tang; but it is a welcome change from those of the Ministerial Dan Sullivan, the “ revival missioiler ” Mr Walsh, or .the ancillary Mr Sheed. • * * * So far the legality of wetting a line has hardly been called in question. The point at issue is the disposal of fish when caught; and, incidentally, fish are very hard to catch at present because the kinds that take the bait are extremely hard _to locate. Bureaucracy’s most dazzling achievement in the matter is the prohibition of the sale of fish “on the beach. The inhibition is based on the grounds of hygiene or pure food, or on anything except pure nonsense. But there are pitfalls ahead of ‘ Gazette ’ notices and inspectorates at one fishing village, Karitanfe. The mouth of the Waikouaiti was Otago’s original port. It has a century of history behind it. and local antiquarians have discovered that river bed and river frontages have been long since delegated to the Maoris as fishing reserves and riparian residential sites. • • * * The Methodists have been exercising themselves on the . real vitality of the Treaty of Waitangi. “ X.Y.’ now suggests to the Baptists to investigate the title-deeds of the Maoris to the flounder haunts, the pipi and cockle beds of the Waikouaiti River, and even the toheroa burrows ,on the crescentshaped beach of Waikouaiti roadstead. It may eventuate that both vendor and purchaser of fish on the beach, also the intervening inspector, may all prove to be trespassers on either side of high-water mark. Is the purchase of fish, gutted and scaled on the gunwale of the “ flattie,” any. less hvtrienic than the release of a greenbone ” from the hook of the amateur rod-fisherman from the rocks' of the South Head? Or is the regulation merely a device to add railway freight, commission, etc., to the local consumer’s outlay and thus boost the Government’s revenue? For to the law-abid-ing person no fish will be edible unless it has first made the pilgrimage to Mecca, traversing twice the famous scenic railway route between Puketeraki and Dunedin. . The law is what Mr Bumble once said it was.

There will be little doubt in the minds of those who read Thursday s papers containing the report of the Returned Soldiers' Association meeting as to the identity of the rather prominent citizen associated with a meeting called by Communists and the exculpation of a country which has extorted from Finland a ' peace dishonourable for all time to the monstrous victor. The Government found it necessary or convenient to pass special legislation to enable this wizard of finance to sit

“The time has come,** (he Walrus saidi “To talk of many things.”

on the directorate of the New Zealand! Reserve Bank. Should he ever decide that he would like to investigate conditions in Soviet Rusisa at first hand it would be necessary for Stalin _to issue a special decree or dispensation to permit of the pilgrim’s progress across the frontier. Poles are rigorously coralled in that part of their country absorbed ,by Stalin, and —_ a deadly insult to the memory of Lenin, . let alone to Trotsky—Jews are now; denied entry to Russia. •■* • * The Australian State which permitted John Lang to rise to the surface and stay there until submergence was deemed imperative continues to provide distressing news at this most inopportune of all moments. This week Sydney cables have emphasised the ' seriousness of the coal miners’ strike, and have indicated the persistence of Russian roubles and propaganda in. New South Wales, “ Russia’s attack on Finland was defended and the Soviet policy praised by officials of the Australian Railways Union.” . The Federal president of that union excelled himself in saying that the proximity of the Finnish border to the Soviet’s centre of industrial activity; (presumably Leningrad, alias Petrograd, alias .St. Petersburg); was a constant threat to the security of the Soviet Union. In vain did jEsop write his fable of the wolf complaining thatf 1 the lamb, drinking well down-stream from himself, was fouling his water.. The fate of the lamb is well _known. Tn. view of the obvious derivation of the triumvirate of fishermen-baiters mentioned in the first prose_ paragraph of this week’s column, is it flogging a ■ dead horse to mention that the name of the Federal president of the Australian Railways Union is Mr T. Morq- • ney? At a guess we should say the T. stands for Tim, **. • • . Anonymity is no doubt a snug hideyhole for newspaper columnists and ditto correspondents. But it is hard to preserve iii a hamlet. Acquaintances have remonstrated that “ X.Y.” impinges unfairly, sometimes on the colleague responsible for the gardening column and sometimes on him conducting tha ‘ Books and Bookmen ’ column. Gardening at the moment is very dead,.tha commanding features of the landscapa being the wind-blasted leaves of runner: beans and vegetable marrows. But at the risk of a prosecution for trespass over the other boundary an anecdote is prompted by mention of /Esop, his flowing stream, his wolf, and his lamb* It is culled from a charming book, ‘ Hebridean Journey,’ whose author recently visited Dunedin and lectured on the short-sighted policy of birth control. Condensed, it runs, thus: An angler, casting conscientiously over every yard of water, encountered a distracted man and asked him what was wrong. “My wife has fallen in,’’ was the reply. “ Where did she disappear ?”• asked the’ angler. “ Down’ there,” replied the bereaved one, pointing away downstream. “ Bui why are you looking for her away up here?” asked the angler. “ She couldn’t float upstream against this,current.” The disconsolate husband shook his head and said: “ You didn’t know my wife.”

Bat for downright perversity the lamb easily beats the female of the species, homo sapiens. As was hinted last week the autumn muster, drafting, and dipping has been achieved. Wether lambs escape the dipping and “ go fop a ride” in two-stofy railway trucks. The ewe lambs “ go for a dip,” and proceed in an orderly queue along .the race, suspecting nothing untoward. But on emerging at the other end they hang about the entrance of the dryingout liens like juveniles'round the door of the Sunday school at a week-night function. They stubbornly refuse to “ come into the body of the kirk ”■ Prod them with the crutch and the compactness of their obstinacy is revealed. A good dog, preferably a “ backer,” is then a godsend. Last week a northern weekly’s doggy expert, pleading for * housing scheme for sheep dogs, stated that good accommodation was due to animals which did work worth from £1 to £lO per week. He was not far wrong. *•. • • Here I light my cigarette, - Feeling very sore." Matches can be bought, as yet* At the corner store. Stocks, alas I are running low, So my grocer says; > Where will all the matches go In the winter days? I have undervalued you, Worthy Robert Bell, ; Though since eighteen-thirty-two You have served us well. Sturdy Bryant, honest May, Will your Noah's Ark Cut its cable, drift away, ' Leave us in the dark? Little wooden splints that strife* Only on the box. What on earth will life be like When your slender stocks Vanish from the grocer’s shelve*, Fizzle and expire? Shall we have to keep ourselves Warm, without a fire? , When the radiator’s bright In one’s house or flat, One may possibly ignite Paper spills thereat. These may do for indoor folk; How will people fare When they try to get a smoke In the open air?' Shall we fiddle, with a lens When the sun is bright, 1 Holding it in mute suspense Till the fag’s alight? Will the hardened smoker’s zeal Fade away to nought. While he plays with flint and steel Till the tinder’s caught? Savages in far-off lands (So I’ve understood) Twiddle with laborious hands Little bits of wood, Rubbing them together till Both are hot enough. I admire their strength of will. Gosh, they must be tough 1 Will our store of . matches ebb Till the last is done, And our local Eb and Zeb Cannot sell me one? _ Till the last obliging friend In a hopeless quest For a match to give or lend Gropes through coat and vestr. Should that fatal day arrive, And the grief it brings, I shall use' no primitive Wavs of lighting things. I shall do what valiant men, Nelson’s heroes, did— Buv a knife and plug, and th°» , Chew an honest quid.