Children’s Column

Matamata Record, Volume XVI, Issue 1443, 20 July 1933, Page 3

Children’s Column

FOR YOUNG MATAMATA FOLK.

; Motto for the Week: A man who never makes a mistake seldom makes anything.

Dear Girls and Boys,—

The days are just slipping past and very soon you will all be talking holidays and examinations. 1933 is more than half over already. You know what a football game is like, but how many of you have seen a polo match ? This game is played on horses; each player having his “ string ” of ponies, sometimes riding two or three different mounts in the one game. It is very hard on the horses, as it is played very fast. There are four players to a team. They play with a willow wood ball about the size of a cricket ball and mallets after the style of croquet mallets, only with long handles. The goal posts are nearly the same as football posts. The ball has to pass between the posts to score. A match is usually played in ten minute “ spells,” at the end of which time the riders usually change their horses. Oh, it is great to watch a good polo pony in action. It seems to know just what to do without the rider guiding it. They turn and flash about so quickly that sometimes it is hard to follow the ball. The horses’ legs are usually v padded to protect them from hits with either the ball or sticks.

The column of original verses in the last paper looked prosperous for the future, didn’t it? So, please, more essays and poems and riddles, especially if you enjoy reading them. We still have new “ Leaves ” coming on “ Our Tree.” This week Olga Familoe is the new one. Well children, please write again, all of you. Some of the very first members seem to have forgotten me altogether. Love from JILL.

TO THE TINY TOTS. Sometimes you do waken just two minutes before you have to get up, don’t you? Not often, of course, but sometimes.

Well, I have a little boy who does the same, and each time he wonders what he will be when he is a man. One day he makes up his mind to be an engine-driver, which must be quite a nice thing to be. Another morning he thinks he’d like to be a soldier; and then he wonders if it wouldn’t be nicer to drive a huge, big racing car.

Sometimes, too, he thinks it must be fun to be a tramcar conductor, and take all the pennies and punch the tickets.

When you think about such things you are day-dreaming. Day dreams are usually very nice, because you dream just what you like best'; but day dreams don’t often come true. Another time he decided he would be a captain on a large boat, tearing through the waves. But it doesn’t pay to day-dream too long in the morning, for you must be up and off to school, or else you won’t be anything at all, that’s certain!

WHAT REPTILE ? My first is in swim, and also in sink; My second’s in pen, and also in ink; My third is in day, but not in week; My fourth is in drink, but not in My fifth is in gentle, but not in harsh; My whole is an animal found in the grass. (Answer at end of column)

BEHEAD AND CURTAIL. Whole, I am a man who used to sail the seas and rob. Beheaded, I am an adjective meaning anger. Beheaded, I am a tax. Curtailed, now I am a rodent. Beheaded, now I am a preposi- { tion. What am I? (Answer at end of column)