LOCAL GOSSIP.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLVI, Issue 13948, 2 January 1909, Page 1 (Supplement)

LOCAL GOSSIP.

yi*t ate hare audience for a word or two."* —Shakes jxsre. , Time rolls its ceaseless course. It seems only the other day that we were welcoming the advent of 1908, wondering what good or evil it would bring to us, and wishing one another all happiness and prosperity. And now the old year lies stark and cold. Its race is run. It is now numbered with the things that have been. Like every, year since the world began it has been » year of changes and vicissitudes. To some it has brought gladness, to others sorrow. In. many homes, it has left a vacant place that can never be rilled. In many more it has brought new life an " joy. Its successor, " the New Year blithe and bold," has now taken up his own. No man. fortunately, is wise enough to tell us what 1909 has in store for us. That is a secret hid in the womb of time. All we can do is to face the future with hope and courage, prepared for sunshine or for storm. To my readers I hope it will be a year which, when it, too, grows old and frail, and finally expires, they may be able to look back upon with sweet memories and flippy thoughts.

The Christmas greetings seem to be more jocund and convincing this season than in the past. In fact, they hava been on a rising scale for many seasons. The earnestness your friends put into their " Merry Christmas and Happy New Year springs from the improvement in their material condition, consequently the heartiness of the greetings that have been heard in the streets during the past week is a tort of barometer of the public prosperity. The heartier the goodwill the greater the good fortune. Mark Tapleys are very rate in the world—too scarce to interfere with (he efficacy of this test of the common peal. To heartily and earnestly wish Other people good luck and happiness when ♦.no is poor and miserable himself is beyond the power of the average weak mortal. The past, year has undoubtedly been a good one, and" despite the gloomy predictions of the croakers there need be no fear that the year just begun will not be an equally prosperous one.

A little knowledge is a dangerous thing, as a suburban youth realised on Boxing Da.- to his sorrow. It was at a West Coast Christmas camp, and the youth had been frightened by an ugly-looking insect ■as they were pitching the tents. " That harmless," exclaimed an old hand, "what you think the sting is only the ovidepository, the instrument for inserting its eggs in convenient places;" and he seized the insect and delivered to the youth a little lecture on the wonders of things. On Boxing Day, another insect frightened some of tho" girls. "That's harmless," explained the youth, " what, you think the •ting is only the ovidepository, the instrument for inserting its eggs in convenient laces and he put his hand to seize the lsect, intending in his turn to deliver.', to the girls a little lecture on the wonders of things. But there are insects andirrTiects, and this time is wasn't a depository but the genuine article ; and the youth explained afterwards that he now understands what it is like to come into contact pith a live wire. , ' Y.

The fruit season is coming. Already Ire have berries, Christinas plums, rind apricots ; in a few days plums, peaches, ppples, pears, and the rest of the catalogue will be with us. Some growers know all the tricks for getting big crops kind high prices, and all growers like to learn. One inquiring Scottish, fruitgrower heard of an orchaidist who bad the fancy fruit of his district, and went to find out how it was got. He found an orchard littered with young green fruit and the expert hand at work "thinning." The Scotchman inquired the reason for this apparent waste, and found it was the way to make the remaining fruit big and luscious. But at this he shook his head. " Mon," he said, "for the best fruit in the world I couldna' do it;" and went sadly away to grow lashings of little apples' and peaches rather than waste any.

When the Wakanui came into Auckland Harbour on Monday, with her decks packed with British immigrants, she was not unnaturally taken for an excursion boat, and everybody wanted to know where on earth she came from. It's a pity we can't get that sort of excursion boat every week, to bring out men and take Home mutton and butter.

There has been a tremendous amount of tenting these holidays. Every old camping ground is white with tents, and new grounds are being started in every direction. Not a bad way of spending the holidays, either. :%:

In a tramcar a passenger was carefully explaining to a lady that the difficulty in earthquakes was that so many people lost their .heads. "How strange!" she exclaimed. "I thought the difficulty was that you lost your feet." |

An Auckland photographer has received the following charmingly simple letter from a little girl in San Francisco;: " Dear Sir. —I was reading in the paper about the nice welcome you gave our fleet. I have a brother who is a petty officer on the New Jersey and he Bent a lot of postals and curios to my big sister and the girl next door. So I thought if there was a kind person who goes in your store who can speak American would send some little curios made by the natives or a postal to me I would be very much obliged, .would send some American thing in exchange. I saw your name on my sister's postals, so I thought you wouldn't mind telling somebody. P.S.—Please do not think I am bold, because our house was burned down in the big earthquake and lire, and I haven't, any more toys, so I wouldlike to put some interesting things in my room. I am sending you four postals to sell in your store for your trouble. The lace is for your little girl." p

How many people who travel by;sea. kaew how to put on a lifebelt? I suppo*« out of every 100 would do it wrongk§|?%lt ie compulsory for all vessels to carry lifebelt*, but it is not, except on American vessels, compulsory that all passengers should be instructed how to fasten them to their bodies. Shipping companies are averse to such instruction being given, on the ground that it would be" calculated to cause unnecessary alarm. But it has been suggested that the desirable instruction might .be given without' fear of scare by introducing into the athletic sports on board some kind of competition In lifebelt fixing. A correspondent in South Africa writing to me on the subject says that he has always, when travelling, taken ftvery opportunity of introducing such a pom petition, which he explains is conductpel in this way :—" How to fix the belt pn is first explained to the competitors (by one of the ship's officers or by a quar-Jer-maeter. The lady competitors stand Tach with a lifebelt lying in front of her nt one and of the deck. From the other «ad the men start racing towarde the ladies, who on arrival of the men, fix the fceltti on them, and the man who first returns to the starting point with the belt (properly put and tied on is the winner. /Thus not only the competitors but the !*hole of the passengers assembled receive Shis most useful instruction. The order »f the race can, of course, be varied by the ladies running to the man, and the "men putting the belts on the ladies, but inthe tropical heat the ladies usually prefer to slo the putting on, and thus have the merit i)f giving them the better instruction. 3 f here's no better way to learn than to do fc. thing yourself." The idea' is such. an excellent one that I hope it will bccoiiie Universal on shipboard. " M I , Maaconft .;'...■ ■ . ;";■. '. ]M ,