UN-HUGHES-ED.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18466, 30 January 1922, Page 6

UN-HUGHES-ED.

PRIME MINISTER’S CABINS. TRIP THAT WAS CANCELLED. Among the sights which a visitor to H.M.A.S. Australia is shown these days as she lies in progress of dismantling" off Garden • Island are two cabins built one on either side of. tho fore-funnel, which, they say (tho Sydney Daily Tlegraph remarks) were put up for members of tho Prime Minister's staff when ho almost made up his mind to take a trip to the mandated territory early last your. Ono wonders who would have endured the discomfort of them in the tropics, since they are placed in one of the hottest spots on the ship, but one is assured that it would not have been Mr Hughes. A large portion of the forepart of the ship was remodelled for tho Prime Minister, a spedal suite of rooms being put up for him. None of the elaborate arrangements wore over made use of, and on his sudden cancellation of Ihe trip much of the woodwork was pulled down. Among the gear • which is now being taken off the ship is an up-to-date icc-raaking machine which has never been used. It is stated that tin's was installed especially to ice tho Prime Minister's drinks, and nobody else lias been able to find % use for it. On board the Australia, rlicy nl-n tell of a store cf rockets and fireworks which were put on board for ihc irin which did not como off. Those wore to have been used in a grand display among the islands to celebrate Mr Hughes’s arrival and give tho natives to understand that the Prince was not tho only one " ho could m«ko a fuss. What the nnsoohisticated black man would have thought of the “ King of Australia ” can only be conjectured. However, ho never saw the rockets, for they were returned to the stores again when the Prime Mmisteff decided not to go.