WHEN AND WHERE?

Evening Star, Issue 25171, 10 May 1944, Page 2

WHEN AND WHERE?

POSERS FOR THE PEOPLE QUIZ QUESTIONS VIGOROUSLY DEBATED There is a new pastime occupying public attention these days, and it has affected all classes. It may be Jieard wherever women get togetner—at the district mothers' meeting, at sewing circles, or over, the nearest dividing back fence j and wherever men foregather—at the local football club, the school committee, or iu those select resorts where one foot reposes with dignity on a brass rail; and, in particular, it is avidly discussed at the Workingmen's Parliament, which holds sessions on the back seat of almost any City Corporation tramcar. Police and prelates, oooks and codktail mixers, savants and servants, are among those who hold forth more or less eloquently. Radio commentators and leader-writers vie one with the other in propounding weighty words of wisdom and in making carefully-studied prophecies on the subject, which is as great a national interest as were cross-words in their heydey, or mah jong in its. In its way it is a development of the present "quiz" trend; in fact, it is the world's super-quiz question, argued on the tundras of Siberia, the pampas of the Argentine, the veldt of South Africa, the ruins of Germany, and the playing fields of Eton. The question? No more, no less, than "When and where?" It is quite unnecessary to make any reference to invasion when the adverbs are used in such conjunction. The tenseness underlying the prolixity of the cabled messages wherein special and other correspondents speak of the approach of " Der Tag," or, in Basic English, " D-Day," is not confined to these sources. Your reserved Dunedinites are just as keyed-up, and each man hopes to be the first to carry the good news from his radio to his neighbour's doorstep. You get supposition served up with your soup at the restaurant; it is linked with the weather as conversation when visitors call; somehow it gets mixed up with the groceries placed on order at your nearest store; it comes in with the daily mail, while the birds of the air long ago ceased to speculate on who was responsible for the assassination of Cock Robin in favour of something more up to date. Even' the shortage of eggs, the Land Sales Court, the merits and demerits of pasteurisation, and the problem of making all ends " meat " in these days' of rationing, are of secondary importance compared with finding the answer to this engrossing problem. Far and away the best place to learn the opinion of the populace is that where all men are virtually equal—the Workingmen's Parliament. Morning, noon, and night, as the trams bounce over the dilapidated tracks, the members of this Parliament air their views vigorously on this important topic, considering every angle and every contingency with all the assuredness of high authority, as well as determining the order of strategy. Speaker after Speaker has arisen, emphatically fixing the date, only to be deposed from his high office through the inexorable march of time and the failure of action to materialise. OPPOSITION PARTY. This failure of offensive operations to develop as speedily as many have anticipated, is raising something of an Opposition in a House where only the AllInvasion Party formerly held all the seats. The Opposition's platform is that •'lt's all a sanguinary bluff. There ain't going to be no invasion. It's all puff and wind." " The Allies are like Poe's Raven," said one staunch Opposition speaker only this morning, basing his address on the party's main theme, but the point was lost, for it was obvious that the general knowledge of Edgar Allan Poe was as profound as the general knowledge of Friedrich Nietzsche, while there was probably more known about the golden-fronted bulbul than about the Raven that " never flitting, still is sittiug, still is sitting." Still, it is something to talk about, is this invasion, and as " to-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow creeps in this petty pace from day to day " tenseness continues to grow, and the Opposition in the Workingmen's Parliament, as in the more serious one in Wellington, gets a poor hearing. "It can't be long now," is the chorussed catchword, drowning out the more pessimistio " It will never he." There will be many who will be deeply disappointed if that remote prospect should eventuate, particularly those who have a financial interest in the issue. Numerous sweeps have been held as to the date, and though many participating in these gambles have already lost their stake, there are many who took a longer view and are still in the running. They should not worry; for invasion is a certainty. irom present indications it should take place on But that is something which must be reserved for the Workingmen's Parliament.