ENTRE NOUS

Free Lance, Volume XVIII, Issue 984, 14 May 1919, Page 19

ENTRE NOUS

A CERTAIN young couple made up their minds the other day to get married in Wellington without beat of drum, brass band, rice, bridesmaids. • Just the two fond hearts, the best man —-a discreet digger, he was —and an indulgent sport who had been dragged into the affair in loco parentis to see that the bride got to St. Peter's on the ticld of the clotik and to cut off her retreat if she showed signs of doing a bolt. The new idea was that nobody should know anything about it: that they would just stroll down the street to the boat afterwards —they were going to Nelson—like an old married couple. Man proposes, but woman disposes of' his proposals in ' her own way. .'..■'» '■'*■ # * This is what happened: The bride on her wedding eve packed her travelling bags, and in this interesting occupation, was assisted by two girl friends * who had been informed in a casual voice that she was "Oh, just going over to Nelson to see her people.". But the girl friends, with the cunning of their sex, smelt a rat, ' The toggery and the lingerie were all new*—far too newfoi anything but the grand climax. So they put their pretty heads together, and when the bride's back was turned sprinkled about six pounds of rice all amongst the new toggery and lingerie. Afterwards they helped to strap up the bagSj and went home with the consciousness of a good deed well done. j " "." *... *• " : *. . * •Now it so happened that the accommodation on the steamer was very limited. The happv couple were separated till they got to Nelson. She v shared a: four-berth cabin with three worldly-wise mesdemoiselles, while he took a shakedown in the saloon. In the meantime, before "lights out" on board, 'the .happy . couple kept up the

married-for-years ago stunt, and did very well. The bride went to her cabin and prepared to retire. She opened her bag, drew forth her nightie, and — L horrors !—shook out about a pound of good rice all over the cabin! * Of course her fellow-passen-gers exclaimed, "Oh!" and "Aha!" etcetera and so forth, and the blushing bride tried hard to explain. It was the same when they got to their hotel. She shed rice wherever she went. The question is, what will happen when the bride meets those two girl friends of hers again?

We have had bike slang, automobile slang, trench slang, and so on. Now we're in for a deluge of air slang. For instance, an air pilot calls life passena kiwi, the New Zealand feathered curiosity that hasn't any wings. A joy ride in the air is a "jazz"-ride; the steering lever of an aeroplane is the "joy-stick." The aeroplane itself ,is a. "boat," or n "bus" or a "taxi." The wings are the "decks." The maximum height is the "ceiling." To achieve a'' pancake'' means that the pilot makes the mistake of levelling too far from the ground with the result that he comes down flat, with, a bump that rattles his teeth. In aeroplaning you don't talk about starting the engine. You simply turn on "the juice." * * * * " '■ . How the astute Mayor and Councillors of Courtrai diddled the Germans out of the city treasury is told in a story that is going the rounds. The Huns came up before they had time to make elaborate plans for hiding the city's wealth. So' they ordered up a hearse and coffin, organised a funeral, piled securities and gold into the coffin, and solemnly, marched along to the cemetery. En route they met the' advanced troops of the Germans, who halted and saluted the coffin as it passed! ' * * * « Genial I>oc. Thacker got away from politics at one of his meetings the other evening at Christchurch and let His audience into some interesting secrets about their interiors. He told them about their hormones. These, hormones, lie said, were the food scouts of the body. If a man on his way home to dinner smelt steak and phipns the hormones immediately telegraphed the news to his tummy, which would immediately liven up in expectation of the forthcoming repast. It. was these goings on that made a man's mouth water and gave him ah appetite. To carry the story further, supposing . this man after smelling steak and onions found when he got home that the missus had only cold mutton, the hormones would signal "wash out steak and onions" to the stomach, which would close up on the deal with the result that the man would lose his appetite. It's a hard world! * * * » With Lenin and Trotsky at their last ditch, and looking for a soft spot to land oh when the crash comes, it might be as well to add up what Bolshevism, which meant the millennium for the masses, actually really amounted to in the grand total. Mr Lockhart, late British Consul-General at Petrograd ought to know, for he has been through the worst of it and was lucky to v escape with his life. He says Bolshevism established a rule of force and oppression unequalled in the history of any autocracy. Themselves the fiercest upholders »of free speech, they suppressed every newspaper that opposed their policy and abolished the right of public meetings. Thousands of men and women were shot, or rotted in gaol without even the vestige of a trial, or sent to the torture chamber. They took hostages. . They struck at their opponents through the women folk. They degraded women to the level of breeding animalfe and desr troyed the home." But their orgy of destruction is nearing its end. The anti-Bolshevik forces are closing in on .'Petrograd. Which, reminds us that the Bolshevik leaders, as per Allied warning, are to be held personally responsible for the acts of Bolshevism. "I never go near a doctor," bragged the man going home in the 5 o'clock rush car for Newtown. "I keep a doctor's book in the house—a good book, mind you—and when there 7 s anything the matter with me I just read up my symptoms, get ihe prescribed medicine, and that's aH there is to it." Which reminds the Ebee Lanoe of the man in the wilds of Waimarino who managed to get along in the same way till he reached the. age of 60, and then died of a misprint. * * * * -Alas, for the kiddies! The Londonderry Board of Guardians recently advertised an appointment for a schoolmaster at the workhouse school. They offered the magnificent sum of £50 a year, and added that the unfortunate appointee "in . addition to his other duties," would be "required to instruct the boys in labouring a portion of the lands." In this same paper the same Guardians advertised for labourers at £3 a week!

A Wellington citizen, well-known in commercial circles, struck a lucky run of three doubles, at the Wellington and Manawatu races. Whether throjugh pure elation of spirits or surpriseshock is not known but the fact is that after receipt of the news of the third double he turned a hack somersault over a flight of stairs and is now in hospital. * # # One of the best cartoons of the war, that made the ' British public laugh unrestrainedly, puzzled the Americans because the joke- was concealed in Cockney slang. The cartoon was entitled "Is it a new "explosive?" and depicted the German General Staff ' scratching their heads over a report that had been captured at a British listening post. The report read: "We gave 'em . watt for not %" * * * '....* In the matter of housing Wellington hasn't got it all on her own. Wherever you look, the cry is the same in all the big centres of the world. The newspapers of London are screaming for a housing scheme and the British Government is sitting on an elaborate scheme at this very moment and wondering where all the millions that it is going to cost are going to come from. It's the same m Washington, the capital city of the United States of the Dollar. Some of' the appeals in the Washington papers from frantic applicants for house-room are funny. Here are a few :—' ' 'Earnestly desired, a boarding house which does hot serve puffed food and sometimes has fried eggs for breakfast for' five extremely wellraised Southern girls. They guarantee no soldier attaches. Answer im r mediately, for' puffed rice is unsustaining." Another—-."One room, kitchenette, and bath or equivalent for l.h.k. (light liouse-keeping-, presumably) by quiet couple of war workers who can't pay a fortune but must live; have a heart!" Quite a large sum it must have cost the trio of "gents" who inserted the following appeal for a roof over their heads: Three gentlemen, with good references and finest Southern cook in Washington . (who lives out), have nowhere to eat or sleep after the 25th. They believe it is possible to find apartment in Washington, with three bedrooms, living room, kitchen, at reasonable rate. Surely the capital city is not unmoved at the prospect of harrowing scene Union Station benches night of 25th and arrival of cook, Tvith stove, eggs, coffee, at depot . morning 26th. . Besides, doubt if cook stands for it through winter. Yet another took a poetic flight: — I . need a place, a little space To hang my cape and bonnet, A bed, some chairs, no cooking cares, Just a single, room. Who has it? The Eternal Feminine is still goingsome. The revolutionary sections of Her held a meeting tinder the auspices of the Women's Freedom Congress, of America at New York the other ■ day and got fresh ideas into the newspapers per medium of the reporters, who leather, enjoyed themselves. : As may be imagined the sex question loomed largely. Some of the Women's Freedomites advocated the retention of maiden names for married ladies. Their argument. wa& that if a lady had made a name for herself in a profession that name was a business asset. A good many of the speakers had bobbed hair, wore giglamps and dressed in; severe tones of voice. One of them said she was a "romantic monogamist" (whatever that may mean). Of course they discussed the question of State homes for all children — sort of chicken run so to speak—where they wouldn't be a nuisance to pa and ma, and all that sort of tommy rot. * * * * A young lady all the way from Australia summed up the various arguments pretty well when she said: "If some women prefer to make the bringing up of their children their profession we won't criticise them. But if you don't care for the mothering job and still have brought children into the world then send them to one of the all-day schools." ' Somehow the Free Xjanob doesn't think that the

Women's Freedom Congress will set the world afire yet awhile. Given a good home, a real womanly kind of wife, a bunch of little happy-go-lucky kiddies, and what man would call the King his uncle ? * * * # ; '• l&ere has been an extraordinary epidemic of traffic casualties in Canterbury. Motor car Collisions occur nearly every day, and people are eonsstantly being killed. , A reporter looked in -at the Christchurch hospital, and the sister in of the accident ward said she had six serious ; cases, and; these were only "the remainder of a. large number," apart from the dead, three for the week. .-.'"Whether it is that the motor-cars are too fast/ or the pedestrians .are*too slow—and they are not very speedy in Christchurch anyway—the fact is there. ■ •■. ".*• ..'.'*'• * ■",#■-.' The house famine in Wellington is not much more acute than it is in some of the southern towns. In Christchurch one is lucky, to get a 7^ Use li Sir Jam6s AUen was asked; the other day whether anything could be done m the case of soldiers wha were_ still undergoing treatment at the hospital as out-patients and who had not been discharged, but had to keep wives and children in boarding houses-' btr James's reply is worthy of preservation as a rival to Marie Antoinette's enquiry, when told that thewomen lacked bread, why they did not eat cake. "I do not understand,'' he said, "why they cannot live in their own homes." ; Life must be a. dreadful puzzle to Sir James. The most up-to-date British airship made her- trial flight on March 15th. fehe is known ;as R—34 and is . 4ft longer than her sister ship. R—33, her length being 665 ft and diameter 80 feet. Five engines give her a total 1,250 horse power, and she is expected to make eighty miles an hour with a load of 29 tons. The R—34 can carry enough petrol to fly to America and back without landing, and when once she is tuned up she is expected to be able to /negotiate the- Atlantic., flight practically regardless, of weather conditions. "■ * * .*-■.'■..'■■ * In addition to the airships several heavier-than-air machines are made or in the making, the best known among them being the Handley Page - products. There is, however, another plane, or set of planes, of which little has been said* but which are being fitted out and tuned up for the special requirements of a transatlantic flight. This squadron (which is under the command of Lieut-Col. Porte), is called the "Flying Furies," from the seaside resort which is their headquarters. During the later stages of the war Porte's Furies did great work against the German submarines,', and now their commanders are out for fresh laurels. ' * i *.■■■?■" •,.'»•:■' . * ' ' Beyond all these the British Air Minister has in reserve a mystery plane "conceited by; a brilliant brain and entirely novel in type" now under construction. It is said that this machine may attain speeds hitherto undreamed of, and possesses qualities of a kind different from anything yet seen. It is known as the Tarrant. It will be driven by six engines developing 3000 horse power. It is on entirely novel lines, which are expected, to insure/ greater control and stability; the most perfect types previously devised.