HOW TO LIVE!

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XVII, Issue 216, 26 August 1927, Page 7

HOW TO LIVE!

WHAT SOME UNEMPLOYED DO A PEEP INTO A PAWN SHOP. BRISK BUSINESS IN PLEDGES. It had been a poor day so far as the reporter was concerned. He had not put pencil ’ paper for the simple reason that he did not know what to make his lead scrawl on the said paper. In desperation he lit a “fag” and strolled down the town with the air of a gentleman of leisure, but nevertheless alert for anything that was out of the usual run. Then he noticed that a rather shab-bily-dressed young man not far in front was experiencing some little trouble with a wristlet watch, presented to him, no doubt, by admiring stay-at-homes. The young man turned, with evident distaste and hesitant steps, into a shop which had blazoned across the window the legend “Second-hand dealer.’’ Just another of the unemployed, was the thought that passed through the rnind of the pressman, who wondered how many more of his fellow-crea-tures had felt the ninch of poverty and who would do anything to keen the “wolf from the d’oor.”

AND THE CUPBOARD WAS BARE.

“Yes business is pretty brisk these days, and some people have got rather low down in their list of pledgeable necessities,” remarked the “pop-shop” proprietor, who betrayed none of the attributes, facial or otherwise, that fiction or the movies demanded of him. A glance around the establishment betrayed many household treasures of better and brighter times. Numberless ornaments that had formerly adorned the piano, graced the sideboard or sat with geometrical precision on the mantelpiece—flower vases, Dresden shepherdesses, plaster-of-naris horsemen, china dogs, stuffed birds—together with watches, jewels of every description, musical instruments from stringed to brass, pictures, oil paintings covered in dust, hundreds of tools for gardening and mechanics, both modern and niid-Victorian. and even a radio set were to be seen. All had. no doubt, with but a few exceptions, been pledggd to replenish the cupboards that resembled those mentioned in the little tale of Mother Hubbard, or perhaps thev liatl' been the means of making safe a little longer the roof that sheltered “him” or “her” and the family. KEEPING THE V.jI.F AWAY. How a truly magnificent statue came into the bands of the proprietor was in course of telling when a woman entered- quite clearly a ladv in reduced circumstances. She laid on tne counter a heavy gold brooch that declared the skill of craftsmen I of another day. when weight bore I some relation to tho price of the price of the jewel. “It was my mother’s,” evidently bv wav of ex-planation-cum-referenco. “and mv grandmother’s before her. It is oldI fashioned, but good. My husband i has been out of work nearly all the year. . , I shall be able to redeem it in a month, I hope, when ” Another brief interval, and the possessor of an overcoat, slightly the worse for wear, makes a good exchange for a pair of boots. His explanation. as he timped out of the shop, was that work would neep him warm as. thank God. he had at last got a job under the “unemployment” scheme, but a pair of stout teles was required. The army of clocks on a shelf ticked out an inharmonious minuti or two. then entered a woman, florid of complexion and ample of girth She thought she could very well do without her epat now that the warm weather wa s coming on. To the reporter it seemed that a drought had anticipated’ the warm sunshine.

THE BRIGHTER SIDE. Just when the reporter had begun to realise that he had overstayed his welcome, there entered a smiling young lady, who called out. “Well. Mr , what have you got for me to-day?” The proprietor then gathered a bundle of books together and' handed them to the girl. “Tell vour mother this is the pile I promised her,” he said. Hardly had the door stopped swinging when in came a well-dressed young man. who also carried a bundle of books under his arm. and these he deposited on the counter. For the next ten minutes he consulted with the proprietor and the reporter as to which books, mainly of the novel and magazine type, were worth reading, and after making his collection, he bargained with the salesman as to the price he would have to pay bv wav of equality of exchange., This puzzled the reporter, who enquired if this exchanging of books was a practice. “Oh, yes,” was the r-’lv. “Why. I have customers from as far south as Dannevirke who exchange booxs with me. Reading is rather an expensive habit these days, so the ‘middle’ class have found this wav of acquiring reading matter. You’d be surprised just what books have passed through this shop. Old and almost new, thev are iust the same.it makes no difference so long M it is something to read and while awav the time.”

The speaker then mentioned that it was nothing to sell a whole library to a customer. Often a boos, out of publication and not now procurable would come into his hands, but there were many “competitors” for these rare books, and the “price was all right.” So it was that the reporter was given a glimpse of the truth of the old adage, “One half of the world does not know how the other half lives.”