THE COMMON ROUND

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18735, 13 December 1922, Page 2

THE COMMON ROUND

By Watfabeb. I cannot road my title clear to the storied status of an “old identity,” and I am too new even to be a “new iniquity”; but I am privileged to remember that “crusty character,” Mr .1. G. S. Grant. Oldtimers assure mo that election campaigns were fur more interesting in the brave days of old than they are at the present time. It is not always safe to trust old-timers in respect to such comparisons, but in this case there is no ground for scepticism. Looking up an O.D.T. file of the year 1867 for something else. I came across the accounts of the battle for the Superintendency, the' combatants being Mr James Macandrew, Mr Thomas Dick, and —Mr J. G. S. Grant. Those were the days of “hustings” oratory. The candidates harangued the electors after the nominations “. . . Anu the banner which we now carry, though it should fall to-night over our drooping 'shoulders, will yet be lifted again in the sight of Heaven, and be borne by the hands of the people of the United Kingdom to a sure, a complete, and a not distant victory.” That Gladstonian prediction in an hour of impending defeat may be _ regarded as the “locus classious” or typical instance of buoyant confidence in adverse circumstances. It may be commended to all the parties and individuals that met with discomfiture on Thursday last. A Dunedin preacher tells us that the Prohibitionists (many thousand votes behind) experienced a “triumph in disguise.” A bold paradox, no doubt ; there can be no question about the disguise; nevertheless that’s the stuff to give tihem, —and I. who say so, am no prohibitionist. Be jolly when things are at their blackest-I—the Mark Tapley philosophy holds the promise of the future. Even the candidates who “forfeited their deposit” may live to write themselves down “M.P.” Hero are a few faded flowers from J. G. 3. G.’s oration; — I belong to no faction but honesty.— (Laughter.) I belong to the cause of conscience and integrity.—-(“Oh, oh,” and groans.) lam no believer either in St. Thomas or St. Andrew —none whatever.— (Confusion. A Voice: “Take your hat off, sir.”) Oh! with pleasure. . . . That system of jugglery which prevails in that miserable village of Wellington. . . . You despise me, perhaps, because I have not money at my heels. I don’t care a straw for that. I am just as wealthy as Mr Macandrew. —(Groans, and a cry of “But not half so good-looking.”) Not so good-looking ! I don’t know about that, either! I have got the “os magnum senatorum” quite as great as he has. — (Laughter.) . . . My supporters have been intimidated—in a village like this! But “ The man of independent mind Is King of men for a’ that.” I am for the agrarian law which Cains Gracchus brought forward in Rome. — (Confusion.) But, never mind, a scholar is not honoured. A man, to be Superintendent, should be like Caesar's wife, above suspicion.—(“Don’t you stand, then.”) You will not hear me ! Then j will address the reporter. (Groans.) All honest men will vote for me; and, what is more, I am the only candidate who is known outside the colony.—(Loud laughter.) Compare with the above this egregious utterance of a defeated candidate last Thursday night: I am not cut out for one of your successful politicians, but I claim that I am honest. I have been thirty-four years in the Labour movement, and have suffered a few defeats, and might put up with many more until the mass of intellectuality rises to a higher level. Compliments, by the way. to Mr MacJVlanus, on his sportsmanlike acceptance of defeat. Quite recently the President of the Arbitration Court gave the cachet of judicial sanction to the snappy but not altogether lovely designation •'chap.” From the judgments of the Arbitration Court there is no appeal, and in any case I wadna preshoom. It is not unlikely, however, that Mr Justice Salmond had his colleague’s too liberal Complaisance in mind when ho checked a witness in the Supremo Court who persisted in using the word (if word it be) “bloke.” “Say man,” said his Honor, “we must have the English language here, you know.” I say ditto; nevertheless “audi alteram partem.” That unlettered witness little thought to what distinguished authority he might appeal. Writes Mrs Watts-Dunton in her published recollections of the author of “Songs Before Sunrise”: I fear it will come as a shock to the least humorous devotees of Swinburne to learn that the hideous word “bloke” was not foreign to his vocabulary. When first I heard him use this word I was almost scandalised. 1 spoke to Walter about it, -. and he —from whom no secrets of the Rossetti circle were hid—informed me that Swinburne had picked up this bit of slang from Dante Gabriel. The poetpainter maliciously revelled in the use ot the argot of the slums, as he had been told that the outside world believed that he and his friends always spoke in a “medieval” style. My ear soon, became inured to the prosaic monosyllable, for Swinburne would often say of a man. he liked “A very affable bloke, So-and-so.” Such terms of speech would be out of place in a Hymn of Proserpine but heard in the homo circle they sounded—thanks to the speaker and his tone —quite pleasant when I got used to them. How the learned judge would have gasped if the witness had respectfully submitted “Please, y’ Honor, bloke’s a word wot’s used, frequent, by Swinburne and Rossetti, —blokes wot wrote potry, y’ Honor.” It is just a year since Dunedin and his friends prematurely lost Dr S. T. Champtaloup, a man whose personal attractiveness was on a par with his professional distinction. Let me signalise the anniversary by reproducing ' some memorial verses which appeared a few months ago in the Otago University Review. Perhaps it will not be impertinent to suggest that the signatory initials indicate a medical and university colleague of him who “was wide of sight.” It should be premised that Dr Chnrnptaloup’s mortal remains lie in the Anderson’s Bay Cemetery:— In iMkmoriam, S.T.A., December 12, 1921. Priests pray that through the ages they may lie Beneath a church dome, where the sunbeams fall Through carven gloom on rood and groin and stall, And, music rolls and incense rises high. On sunny sandhills underneath the sky, 1 He lies, where yellow sprays of lupin tall Fold over all the dead their perfumed pall, And all is silence save the seabird’s cry. ’Tis a wide prospect opens to his view Headland on headland to tho horizon height Thrust out to sea; that strange Pacific hue, Bedecked this windy noon with crests of white, Chill Northern grey through blazing Tropic blue— Fit resting-place; for he was wide of sight. . C.J. Those verses—quiet, lucid, touching, restrained, .distinctive— might almost; conquer the anti-poetic prejudices of people who are of tho same way of thinking as Mrs Green (of the Cabbage Patch); I’m not one of them as doesn’t say plain what they mean, like the people in potry, for h’liistaneo, as spends their time tryin’ to put theirselves superior go’s you ’ave to guess at ’em, but seldonj worth the trouble when you do. . . . Take the young person in Hoggselcior as couldn’t speak in anything but motters. Perhaps it is ungrateful to persist in deriding the autobiographic (and other biographic) labours of Mistress Margaret Asquith, for her naive self-revelations have, undoubtedly, contributed to the gaiety of nations. Besides, in spite of a pachydermatous temperament, she might “burst into tears”—which would be embarrassing. Herbert could hardly speak of Henry’s conduct throughout tho whole anxious week without emotion, and ended by saying: “You have done nobly throughout, Margot, and I’ve been much struck by your wisdom and generosity.” At which I burst into tears. This was at the time of the formation of the Campbell-Bannerman Ministry in 1905. “Henry” is, of course, Mr Asquith (or the husband of Mrs Asquith), while “Herbert” is the present Lord Gladstone —of whom Mr Lloyd George has tartly remarked that he is “the best living embodiment of the Liberal doctrine that quality is not hereditary.” By the way, in Margot's political entourage most people call most people bv their Christian names—just like Mr Martin and Mr Wycherley at the Otago Cricket Association meeting last week. “The discussion then developed into a kindly, smiling exchange between the chair-