THE COMMON ROUND

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22631, 24 July 1935, Page 2

THE COMMON ROUND

By Wayfarer.

I A calculating commercial voice is raised. “ There are too many harbours in New Zealand.” We have heard it before. What can yon do with these people? A sea change is needed. Here we are on a couple of islands a thousand miles from anywhere, in a stormy latitude, with a rock-bound coast, and they say we have too many harbours. The trouble is that we have 100 few. As.; the coastal skipper who goes up and down the length of our seaboard in ali weathers. Ask the fisherman who find.-, himself offshore in a gathering gale. Nothing between Otago Heads and the Bluff, nothing this side of Oainaru. Look at the West Coast and both sides of the North Island. League upon league and never a haven to run in to. Think of a really hospitable coast'line for a comparison. Were our rivers not mountain torrents, but decent well-behaved navigable streams, we should have estuary harbours - in plenty. And then we might be the maritime people we ought to be, but are not. Indeed we are woefully non-maritiine—south of Auckland W T e become more so. Once you could take passage up and down the coast. That has gone. The Red Funnel steamers will no longer carry you. You must go by railway. The Government hates the coaster. It talks of “ co-ordina-tion of transport.” With the old craft, old amenities have disappeared. Up and down the coast plough gr&at ships and small, and never a berth on any of them for the traveller who likes the sea-road. And a sententious voice breaks in. “We have too many harbours.”

“ This everlasting slaughter on the roads! " Such words from the chairman of the executive of the Automobile Association may not fall as the gentle rain from heaven. Yet they are welcome. The Russian Soviet has not onr unmixed admiration. But it has decreed that motor drivers involved in serious accidents while under the influence of liquor shall be liable to the death penalty. In New Zealand as yet we kill scarcely more than one person every two days on our roads. We deplore man’s inhumanity to man in a less enlightened age. We look hack with horror to the lot of little .boys condemned to chimney sweeping. A century ago a chimney might be made only seven inches square, so not only a tiny but a naked child was necessary. A master sweep has left record that he was articled at the age of three and a-half. In pueris naturalibus he was sent up a chimney. So Mr Walter de la Mare recalls in a new of social significance.. He offers the just commentary: —

Yet, do not let ua be in too much of a hurry to impute righteousness to ourselves. In 1933, one thousand and thirty-eight children were killed on our roads and sixty to eighty children were injured or crippled every day in road accidents, while the R.S.P.C.C. has had to deal with about 40,000 cases annually of various forms of cruelty to children.

The dear people who write so feelingly about stray dogs too often betray their own-disposition. Jjet them try befriending them for a change. He is hard hit, the dog, by the machine age. One impression of England is of her kindness towards animals. » On the steps of St. Paul’s Cathedral and the Royal Exchange the portly pigeons pout and strut In Trafalgar square the same two sparrows come daily to the band of the old gentleman who brings them afternoon tea. In Regent’s Park the squirrel will take a peanut from your fingers and give an inimitable performance for payment. Across the finest boulevard ifa St. James’s Park in a crowded hour a mother duck will waddle in perfect confidence, leading her , tottering brood in slow procession. Where traffic swirls most wildly Grimalkin, on sill or railing, serenely trims his whiskers. Are there many capitals, queries a newspaper, that could present such a scene as this —in Fleet street? When traffic was busy a gingercoloured cat came rushing east in the roadway, its tail enlarged, and in a flurry. It got Ixpneath a Kensal Green bus, which stopped at once. The con-' ductor gpt out, passengers got out, the street crowd gathered, and everyone tried to induce the ginger cat to move. It refused to budge. Traffic _ was stopped right down to<Ludgate Circus —perhaps to the Bank —for about three minutes until someone reached the cat with his hat. The cat then rushed under two cars and crouched under a motor van, and traffic stopped again until the cat was dislodged, darted through the east-going traffic at the risk of one or two of its lives, reached Fetter lane, and hopped round into a by-court. The bus drivers and motor drivers wiped the sweat from their brows, and this Imperial city resumed its affairs. In Dunedin we have the dog poisoner.

You will notice sometimes in a football game that' there is a lull in the hostilities. In a companionable way the players gather in a close circle. The referee looks nonchalantly on. From the pavilion a figure sprints across the field waving what might be a white flag or anything. The crowd fidgets indulgently. “What are they, doing, daddy?” asks some tender novice. Daddy grunts sardonically. From the ring a ragged clout hurtles into the air A terrier carries it off in triumph. The whistle goes, and the battle is renewed. Is a player in order in scoring a try without his trousers was the question that came before a northern referees’ association last week. Is it football? Is it legal? The verdict was in the affirmative. There will be no immediate appeal to the higher Rugby courts. But football authorities may be wondering where precedent may lead. Does a new problem threaten the full-back? Imagine his discomfiture, clutching desperately a pair of shorts the owner of which is streaking safely over the line. Apart from players the popular aspect of the question has to be considered. In an Australian message Hcmi is referred to as the “ polished ” centre of the Maori touring team. Naturally, the Queenslanders found him elusive.

In another branch of sport a different problem has presented itself. Trophies for bowling have beep gravely pondered by the New Zealand Association. It has defined a trophy as “ an article kept by a player as a lasting memento of the occasion.” That is regarded as ruling out poultry. But need that be? There will be no ifidignation meetings in the fowl runs. But we have known birds that might well he a lasting memento. How wearisome the eternal cups and shields that are ladled out for prowess in sport! And how fine for illustrative purposes the pictures of what might be! The Mayor of Dunedin presents Otago’s champion* of champions with a noble turkey: Miss Syndicate brings home the clucking Masport Crate: behold a window display of sucking-pigs for successful golf gourmands. Moreover we should help primary industry. It is a world issue. At recently there was hot debate on whether at a public function the Mayoress and the wife of the Chief Constable should be presented with bouquets of flowers or joints of beef. The butchers, fruiterers, and florists of the Chamber of Commerce fought it out with fervour. The florists won, but the secretary was instructed to insert the butchers’ protest in the minutes of the meeting.

There are two sides to every question,

; In the interests of primary producers “ Eat More ” campaigns are common. In the seclusion of his consulting room the advice of the doctor is generally, “ Eat less.” A well-known Auckland medico

deplores the signs of increasing physical degeneration in our people. The blame is thrown upon the Health Department for not pouring enough milk into the school children. “ Exaggerated nonsense ” growls one of its officials. The cartoonist has an opportunity of showing how Sir Alexander Young goes round with the milk-cans. Speaking of the trials of headmasters, a delegate at a conference in England described how they had now gone into the milk business. He added: But you are not going to tell me that all children need this milk. I - know of lusty, healthy kiddies charged to full capacity 'with bacon and eggs or bacon and tomatoes who within an hour of leaving the breakfast table are imbibing quantities of milk.