THE AMERICAN TOURIST.

Lake County Press, Issue 2697, 30 August 1917, Page 5

THE AMERICAN TOURIST.

Amusing Incident.

A writer in an American journal who recently visited New Zealand gives his •• impressions." One of the most amusing paragraphs in his long article is that in which he deals with country newspapers. He informs his readers that " every country newspaper is run by just a man and a boy." This may be true of a few, but it is a good way from being true of moat country newspapers. It is not even true of the country newspapers in the north of the South Island. The critic goes on—" I weDt intc one little country office and asked to see the editor. After waiting some time the augu6t personage entered the little room I was in (which I will call the reception room) with a grave countenance, head a wonderful head thrown back, chest thrown out, and shoulders squared. He was clean shaven, and somewhere between forty and fifty. I talked to him in French, but he understood not a word. Then I tried Spanish, but with no better luck, for I finally made a remark of a somewhat uncomplimentary nature, and elicited no response. I was having a good time at the great man's expense, but perceiving that hj« waß becoming impatient and inclined to bolt I roared out in the dialect of our Sou them States that I .ranted a paper. I put clown a shilling-piece. He picked up the money and vanished. The next moment I overheard Inm saying to somebody in an adjoining room, 'Give the lunatic this, and tell him to go to .' The next instant the devil appeared on the Bcene, and handed me a copy of the latest issue of the thunderer and sixpence change. Expecting eleven pence I asked, * What do you moan ?' hut the devil was disappaaring before the last word was out of my mouth. I knocked, shouted oaths in German, and did a war dance, but no one came, and I left feeling that 1 had beon clean done. I afterwards discovered that I had not been tjyercharged, and when I became acquainted

with the editor's notions on grammar and composition, and read his unique report of a clergyman's wedding I not only did not begrudge the money, but I would not part with my copy of that buster for a dozen dollars. Every friend to whom I lond it laughs till tears roll down his cheeks."