LOCAL GOSSIP.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LII, Issue 16098, 11 December 1915, Page 1 (Supplement)

LOCAL GOSSIP.

BY MEHCTTTIO.

Tins results of the National Register should make the married man more contented with his lot. Ho always was a little envious of he wealth of the unmarried man and quick to applaud any suggestion for a tax on bachelors. It appears, however, that there has been a mistake. The unencumbered smile man is a rarer bird than has been thought. For every two of the familiar type of bachelor with his pocket* full of c-iin there is one with dependants.' - Everybody knows the bachelor with domestic cares, but few were prepared to mid him in such numbers. PerQape in many cases the dependance looms larger en registration day than on pay day, hat the women will tell you that this is often a fault with married men as well as with single. If you are not inclined for khaki it is a comforting thine 'he.se days to have a few dependants as a buff:'- against the pressure which a member of Parliament has called the "conscription of public opinion."

Everybody has been busy this week endeavouring to read the minds of the 54.000 who answered '"No." It is like many other things in this world; people see in it just what they want to see. Some say that there are among them numbers of conscript whose negative answer was directed solely at present conditions and meant as a spar to the present Government. If this is so it may have the intended effect, because many of those who answered "Yes," whatever they thought of it before, are now convinced conscriptionists. However they reasoned it, there is no getting away from the fact that the 34,000 are not volunteers, and since a large proportion of them are in the first available class it presents a problem which must be faced before very long.

There are ail sorts of views on the recruiting business. A correspondent writes to say he does not agree with the Prime Minister that the fact that a man has a business or farm is a valid excuse for not enlisting. He puts it this way : •' If it is a business or farm showing a taargiD of profit it is only an additional reason "why he should enlist. At all event*, it may lie said that a single man with a business or farm has more chance to get a capable manager over the recruiting age than the average family man has to get anybody to see to the needs of his wife and children."

Tlie action of the returned soldiers who gave an unkindly welcome to the passengers by the Remuera is not very generally approved, hut they have to be thanked for calling attention to the little fact that the men who have dropped into the Dominion during the past few weeks are not on the National Register. They may be on the British register, but if they are they are lost to it. The New Zealand register should be kept complete by the addition to it of every man who arrives from overseas for residence in the Dominion.

Waitemata was last in the Queen Carnival contest, but are there many districte that can give a lead to Devonport in recruiting? Two hundred old boys, of Devonport School gone to the front is a very fine record. Devonport in this matter rmst be very near the top.

The risks that men run in the firing-line are numerous and diverse, but an Auckland soldier who has recently returned from the front after receiving eight wounds, has had an experience which is surely an uncommon one. Two of his wounds were caused in a unique manner. The leg of a comrade, another Aucklander, was shattered by a Turkish shell. Whilst the first-mentioned soldier escaped injury from the shell itself, he -was unlucky enough to be struck and wounded by pieces of bone from his mate's leg.

Another Auckland soldier tells a story of a southern member of the expeditionary force who sums up his experience of the campaign in the soccint phrase, " well punctured-" At the outset he underwent the ordinary vaccination as a precaution against smallpox. He was subsequently inoculated twice to guard against enteric and there were also two anticholera inoculations. He was wounded twice, and one of the wounds being in the hand, an injection of an an-tetanus prophylactic was added to the list. Finally the man contracted dysentery and was given the usual treatment for that complaint, including another inoculation. The two wounds brought the total number of punctures up to nine and the man has survived them all! As a friend has aptly expressed it, " He must be a human collander."

Despite the several mistakes on the part of the " white feather " brigade, of which mention has already been made, in bestowing their attentions upon returned New Zealand soldiers whom they unconsciously encounter in mufti, incidents of the kind continue to occur. An Otago man, who was under machine gun-fire, was struck by three bullets, which it is stated went through a note book that he was carrying in his right hand pocket and which he has brought home with him. Tw o of the bullets are still in the soldier's chest, and it was naturally disconcerting to him the other day to be stopped in the street in Dunedin by a young iady and presented with & white feather. , " A Bluejacket of the Old Niger" writes:"The first Victoria Cross won in .New Zealand, was by a bluejacket of H-M.S. Niger, outside New Plymouth, storming the Wairika Pa, on March 28, 1860. It was won by William Odgers, leading seaman. Odgers was one of the first in the pa, and cut down the flags. Captain Cracroft promised us £10 on that occasion, which we spent on our first leave m Auckland afterwards. The flags were carried to Government House and presented to Governor Gore-Brown, by New Zealand boys who had lately joined the Mger. One of them was my beloved shipmate, and vour honoured citizen, Mr. George Powley. The ladies of New Plymouth testified to the good services rendered to them on that occasion by presenting Captain Cracroft with an address signed by themselves." One of the most necessarv bv-laws ever Passed by the Auckland City" Council is that prohibiting the wearing of hat pins without, protectors by ladies. The prosecutions that took place some time ago had a wholesome effect, but there are still B°tne women who honour the regulation more in the breach than in the observance. They are occasionally 6een in crowded and are apparently in need of a .-entle reminder. The Railway Department has been caught at last. It has for a long time had the public rather at a disadvantage with regard to level crossing accidents, for, if you by chance narrowly escaped death at a level crossing, you were lucky indeed if you also escaped an appearance before the magistrate for disobeying the railway warning. A Taranaki man has, however, turned the tables on the Department, having jot a verdict for £600 compensation for the loss of a leg. A fewsuch verdicts would make a wonderful difference to the safety of the crossings.