PASSING NOTES.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 9195, 15 August 1891, Page 5 (Supplement)

PASSING NOTES.

(From the Otago Witness).

All qniefc on the Potomac. Nothing noticeable in Wellington, and, as a consequence, myself hard up for a political note. Such is the bulletin for the week. The Land and Income Tax is steadily crunching its way through committee, thanks to what ■•hon. gentlemen of the Opposition are wont to call a brutal and insensate majority. But, bless you, when a majority's against you it's always brutal and insensate. We who have neither land nor income of taxable proportions can watch the progress of the bill with equanimity, and charitably hope that Mr Baliance may get from it all the revenue he wants. The Shop Hours Bill is likewise on its way to the statute boob, and we may look for a thick crop of sly grocery selling cases anon, for it will be long before we are educated up to the kindly legislation that prescribes when we are to buy and when we are to refrain from buying. Never was a bill so petitioned for and protested against, and the reasoD is not far to find. The shop assistants are for it to a man—ahem, pardon, ladies—l mean to a man and a wcman. A vile phrase that, but it must serve for want of a better. The monopoly of man is doomed, and women are not to be ignored for lack of a phrase. I would suggest, however, to our female franchisers that they set themselves to devise a Bet of terms that will embrace the Bexes with neatness and propriety. In doing this they will supply what is called a felt want. Bat this is a digression. The shop assistants are clamouring for the bill, moved thereto by a keen perception of the advantages of shutting up at 6,—of course onfrill pay. The shopkeepers are dead against it, and by a curious coincidence, for exactly the same reasons. So much depends on one's point of view. It remains to be seen what will happen when the bill passes, bnt if I were an assistant I should press for a clause making it a penal offence for an employer to reduce wages. Verb, sap

The reported reappearance of the sea serpent is interesting but untimely. We are no longer in the ages of faith. Three credible and intelligent witnesses aver that the monster was seen of them in daylight, by the naked eye, near at hand. It is not merely that they testify in vague generalities to his spacious form and ample proportions. They were privileged to note the out of hia jib, the colour of his back hair, the glare of bis cold grey eye, and all the scaley horror of . his tail. Three intelligent and credible witnesses, observe; and yet we don't believe them.. Is&y "we," butl must discriminate. Personally I do believe—at leist I believe that I believe; and there is a gooddeal of religious faith that doesn't get much further than that. Strictly speaking it 'is Professor Hutton and Sir James Hector who do not believe. It may have been " the moss-grown trunk of a tree" says Sir James. Yes, it may have been. It may also have been the whale that swallowed Jonah, or the dolphin that carried Arion. Sir James should try again. The Professor goes on • a different task. He ventures on no conjectures, but simply disbelieves and gives his reasons—and therein gives himself away. " There is nothing in zoology or geology leading up to the sea serpent," say 3 the Professor. What, nothing? What about bis iethyosauruses, then, bis plesiosauruses, his pterodactyl?, and the other polysyllabic monsters; of the olden times? The scientific mind is narrow— awfully narrow; it lacks poetry and imagination. It is the kind of mind that would wind up ' a reading of "Paradise Lost" by the question, "What does it prove?" As against the sceptical professor let me set a sentence from the Encyclopedia Britannica (last edition)—no mean authority: It would thus appear that, while, with very few exceptions, all the so-called " sea serpents " can be explained by reference to some wellknown animal or othet natural object, there is still a residuum sufficient to prevent modern zoologists from denying; the possibility that some Bach creature may after all exist. A large admission for a sceptical age. Perhaps next time that the New Zealand sea eerpent comes up from his dark nnfathomed ocean caves to interview a U.S'.S. boat, he will stretch his scaley neck over the side and' snap up a passenger or two, or whip the ..captain off the bridge. Then we shall beJieve. It is not often that the unrighteous find ■reaßon to rejoice in the decisions of Mr Justice Williams. Bnt law has its surprises, as-well as mining. If a bank lends money in the form of overdraft to the directors of a mining company it would seem certain that the bank has a legal claim on somebody to get thit money back. Certain? There is nothing certain in this world but death and tax6s. It may be that the bank has a legal claim on nobody. Such is the law in the Break o' Day case, and sound law it is, 2 don't doubt, thongb somewhat likely, as before remarked, to make glad the heart of the ungodly. In " the mountain village of Naseby"to quote a local correspondent, •"there is much unholy glee over it."

Scene: The snuggery of the village pub. Occasion: A free-and-eapy to celebrate the improved prospects of mining, a.telegram having been received during the day from a well known K.C.M.G. announcing his Honor's decision in the Break o' Day case. The company consists ■chiefly of certain promoters of the Nenthorn •Reefs, locally known as the " Potters."" After suitable libations, the Potter-in-chief takes up 1S» parable somewhat as follows; Worshipful Brethren, —From this day the honoured name of "Potter" acquires a new significance. Have we not " dished " the B.N.Z. New Zealand's greatest pawnbroker. That venerable institution poured onf .treasure from the fulness of its globo assets; to see, or, rather, let us see, if there was any golden quartz in Nenthorn. The bank was very kind. Its manner was not the ordinary manner of banks—it gave all; it took nothing ;-"»no, not even a joint.and several. A number of highi-principled directors—myself among the number—with your full knowledge, overdrew the company's banking account, without saying to any of you; by your leave, or curse your soul, or observing any other civility. The *esult is that, although we have enjoyed all the benefit, it has been decided that we are subject io no responsibilities. In other words—Brother Pottera—our game has been " heads we win, tails you lose." Ihanka to the bank's money, we have had the'ehapee of being pade rich without any risk of being made poor—a thing quite unprecedented in the annals even of mining. For all these and manifold other blessings we have to thank—

But here I cut him short. We don't need to be told who it is that the "Potters" of Nenthorn or Naseby v have to thank." The J>evil looks after his 6wn !

Talking of Nenthorn, I observe that the Eureka Company has had a. crushing and a •washing up: yield—2oooz of gold from 160 tons of stone. A two-line announcement in these terms appearei a: week ago. Not a word of comment has followed—good or bad, though I see that "A Shareholder" offers in tfcis morning's Times a subscription of 20s towards a fund for putting the company into liquidation.. Why is this 1 Here is a Nen-thorn-company that extracts £7.50 worth of gold oat of 160 tons of quart?, jet the ■fact is passed over in silence as if it were an indiscretion that charity forbade the mention of. than this, a shareholder writes to the papers indignantly demanding that the company be wound up. The facts are curious, but they may be explained. Nenthorn and JJenthorn reefs stint in the nostrils of the public. The mention of them is as smoke to .the eyes, and as vinegar to the teeth. In our present state of mind it is impossible to believe that any good thing can coawout of' Nenthorn. .If 200oz of gold came ont of Nenthorn last week, that gold i« not as other gold. Jt is the money of the genii ,s»hich will turn to withered leavesmore calls and liquidation notices. That's jhow we feel about it, I fancy, and the feejing -4s slightly irrational. "?ou see we are just ,now in about the lowest deep of a mining ■" depression." It is the cold fit in alternation with the hot fit of two years ago, and the one extreme is as far from right reason as the other. I am not going to suggest that Nenthorn may turn up trumps yet,— far *rom it I I should expect that the leaders of Passing Notes would be ready to atone me. All the same, 200oz from one washing np is a .somewhat impressive fact.

I like football. Time was, indeed—and not so far back as the consulship of Plancus—when I played myself. But for divers reasons, whereof some are not wholly unconnected with the width of my waistcoat, I have long ceased to take what reporters call an active interest in the game. Jeehurun kicked when he waxed fat, but with the footballer it is not so. He ceases to kick, and by a steady gradation or declension becomes first an umpire, then a referee, and in the end sinks, into the mass of spectators. It was in this ultimate capacity that I took part in the match between Canterbury College and Otago University and did a little well-bred barracking in the local interest. I'm not going to describe the play. It was good on both sides—let. that suffice—and liars moved dubious betwixt the hostile

To tins end, however, as "its" are cl'.eap, let me venture to hint to the 'Varsity team, in the most distant and delicate way in the world, that if they were to practise more they might, haply, play better, and if they played better they might fare better, for somehow Providence is almost always on the side of the strongest battalions. This annual match is steadily growing in importance and interest. Comparing small things with great, it will in time become with us something like what the Oxford and Cambridge boat race is at Home—the athletic event of the year. They say that the " stroke " of the winning crew is a man more envied and honoured in Cambridge than the senior wrangler, and the day will come in Otago when our undergrads will hold that greater is he that kicketh a goal than he that winneth a scholarship. In the matter of scholarships, Canterbury must have some mysterious natural advantage over ns. Not a doubt about it; or why should she annex so many ? It is easier to state the fact than explain it, but jersonally I incline to the theory that in some subtle way, shingle bed and artesian water are at the bottom of it. But be this as it may with scholarships, it won't account for her winning four games of football out of six, and that, I understand, is the record. In the absence of any sound philosophical reason why this should be I would again suggest to our boys to try what steady work and a healthy esprit de corps can do. Who knows? The winning of matches may lead to the winning of other things that university people prize.

English society has been and continues to be like a troubled sea over the baccarat scandal, and ripples from the centre of disturbance are still transmitted to our shores by every successive mail. The Prince took to gambling, say some of his apologists, .because "it affords him relief from the misery of making conversation." "He is a man of phenomenal energy"—shouldn't have thought'it I —"who has no adequate sphere for;,his*p6wers." .• He is not a reading man, "ho-one, ever saw" him ; absorbed in a book;" his .idea, of an intellectual-evening is to preside over a baccarat bank, as at the Wilson's, where "there were 14 players at table, packed together like herrings in a -barrel. Seven of them were men, each puffing a big ' Havannah,' the smoke of the seven cigars concentrating in the middle of the table, and obscuring, the iviewC of; the players, whose senses were already' deranged by long draughts of brandy and soda settling down on stomachs already irritated and overloaded by an interminable luncheon, followed by a Gargantuan dinner." Poor Prince I he has been unofficially censured by Continental military authorities, particularly in Austria, where he is " proprietor-colonel" of a regiment, for gambling with subalterns, and he has been publicly prayed for as a mauvais sujet by the Methodist Conference. Altogether the cup of the Prince's humiliation would seem to be full, whilst, on the other hand, Sir William Gordon Cumming, the real delinquent, is thriving on his shame. Sir William has married his Yankee heiress, ' big, bpnncing, and beautifnl," society merely hinting its sense of the indecency by circus lating a not-bad story that the marriage announcement was to wind up.with the words "no cards." The literature of the baccarat case can't,be called edifying, but it is distinctly amusing—in spots. Civis.