NOTES AND COMMENTS.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXI, Issue 13373, 27 February 1904, Page 11

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

The undertaker who sits upon a sick door-stop probably regards himself as an up-to-date man of business, in an ago when competition is the thief of trade;’but his presence is not so warmly appreciated by the invalid whoso measure ho is taking prospectively. This gentleman, we are given to understand, is nob a creation of the disordered imagination, but is founded upon fact quite as faithfully as are the stories of Miss Yongo and A.L.O.E. As a. modem instance he naturally takes a lot of beating, and it is all the more to the credit of a New Zealamd town, that his record should have been put to shame most completely by that of a certain' truant officer. A young gentleman who is about to tempt fate br leading a bride to the altar declares that this particular public functionary has been sitting upon the door-step of big new-ly-acquired house for a week, demandm why he does not send his children to school. He regarded the inquiry for a time as an instance of premature impertinence, hut the inevitable explanations Vhich ultimately forthcoming disclosed that there had been a misunderstanding as to ld end that it was Benedict, andnob Romeo, of whom the officer was in search.

With the coming of the New Year, the Empire hag had lifted from breaWas table, a burden which was rapidly bccom ng Greater than it could hear. The IS." of the “Encyclopaedia Brittamca, bj “ Times.” was probably quite the' mo masterly piece of advertising work’thiit has even been accomplished. But the En cloptedia ” was beginning to stink in tl nostrils of the people.- It was sawed.up m the cables, in the leading columns ur L correspondence columns* and IT } P commercial columns of the Press simply ad nauseam. It ™YC!unring to get upon people s nervesqmeu consciously in many cases, stdU ; a TuwU'»'hW na the weatnei, it was wim i„ p pool * J - 0U °ioilej Ot .ttollog Swi sss:*t*sit StejaprK^-

It is nob very long since ther a | t a fluttering of the dovecote* of lurch when some feminine iconoclast Sr c l in o t oi inidst a charge of rompy S . cfan. it ho that Christchurch h» been a fashion? It would seem so the “Pall Mall Gazette” says, m * port of horrified anger, “ A great man} . ' Vila do not dance the lancers nonadajs , fw prance it. And the odd thing is that the Maher von go in the social scale the more - violence yon find in dance, until von arrive at a. level where it lias to he left opt of the hall programme atogether” ' /According to the Gazette there are daughters of families Who sav that their dress money will not imi to their dancing the lancers. Strewn with . torn rAohon, odd bits of jeweller} fra ■ ments. of F l'acp dr chiffon, many a ballroom floor almost suggests a battlefield of ii s°‘h when a set of hiucers has been finished and the dishevelled dancers have sought what Jlnrh Twain would, have called the-never-before-so-needed refreshment.

A recent illustration of this undesirable >tats of affairs .is reported to have occurred at a dance given, quaintly enough, in aid of the “ Dumb Friends’ League,” at Hove. The function was patronised by all the rank and fashion of Brighton, and even a Mairhioness figured among the chaperones. Thera .were, .two, sets .of. lancers upon, the programme, and each of tnem produced', what was practically a riot. Gentlemen, arm in arm, tore up apd down the hall in long rows; ladies did the same, and quiet people looked on in blank amazement. Presently the boisterous gentlemen,, some of whom were id hunting scarlet, and were evidently under the impression that they were chasing the “little red fox” across the downs, emphasised' the gaiety of their spirits by loud and continuous shouting, till the hall'was in a- perfect uproar. At the .close of the second figure the pandemonium had grown so great that a lady across and stopped the bund there and then.' It was a drastic hint, but it sufficed. Christchurch should be quite proud of this enviable parallel to her experience of “ kitchen lancers.”.

That particularly critical London child who on being taken to the country for the first time in her ljfo protested, that she did not -want milk from a.•nasty dirty coy', but preferred the town method of getting it from a nice clean bright can, was probably happier in her ignorance than most people. It really docs not Eoem to matter, what wo cat or drink so long a.« we imagine it is what we ask for. A London milkman has been trading upon this weakness of tho average human being by dispensing a mixture which contained no milk at nil, bub only water coloured with some mysterious concoction called “n'natto,” When he was stopped by an inspector who naked l for a sample of his wares, instead l of emulating Simple Simon and asking “ Show me first ypur penny,” this guilty-conscienced individual basely deserted his cans and bolted down the road. Ho was ultimately captured <ind ! asked for an explanation before a Justice. He called evidence to show that a milkman always ran on his rounds, hut the Bench decided that the run on this occasion was a most inopportune one and :allously fined him £5.

The “ Saturday Review ” has never troubled to conceal its dislike of America and Americans, and now its bitter jibes have been directed against Mr Andrew Caruegio’s , library .donations. The recent Corelli-Winter libel action, over tho Carnegie Free Library at Stratford-on-Avon, furnishes the text. “ The matter of real importance, says tho “Saturday,” “is what is going to be done about this "library? If a library is really wanted, it should be built in some other street than that of tho Shakespeare birthplace. It should be built with English money. We do not want to become the dumping-ground for millionaire philanthropists of America any more than for tho destitute aliens of Europe. Let Mr Carnegie set up his libraries in his own country.. We cam pay‘for our own.” It would bo interesting to know what various town comcils in How Zealand think of the question. Evidently they cannot “ pay for their own.”

Most men- 1 have a beta noire. Mr P. F. Warner lias several. Umpires are his betas noire?, caul he must dream about them qvhen ho goes to sleep. ' There was an “ incident ” on tbs West Coast of New Zealand, and, if memory servos, there was an umpire “in-

cident ”in Christchurch. There was one in Sydney, and another in Melbourne, and another has just been barely averted! Concerning the merits of the latest dispute there is no need to argue. The point is not that Warner was right or wrong, but that he hit up against another “incident,” and all on account of an umpire. Some men are like that. Bananas will disagree with some, pastry with others, and German sausage With, others. Some men get confused and irritable when they see girls with red hair; others when the girls have goo-goo eyes. It is all a matter of constitution. If only cricket could be. played without umpire*, « Warner’s life would probably be one of uninterrupted bliss—always allowing for such .little’accidents as failing to score. When he meets Ids Waterloo, and is praying for Blucher or night, his own umpire will give him out, or.will give Blucher out, which would be equally disastrous. And by an irony of late, when his active cricketing days are over, he will probably take to umpiring on his own account, and every match, twill have an umpire incident.