DRAUGHTS ITEMS.

Otago Witness, Issue 2244, 4 March 1897, Page 40

DRAUGHTS ITEMS.

Editors' Geography.— The West Lothian Courier of December 12 has a paragraph " How They Do It at the Antipodes," which commences: We learn from Champion Little's excellent column in the Melbourne Weekly Press," <fee. Rathtr a blow to our self-conceit, isn't it ; to find the otherwise well-informed and careful Editor Gilbertson so ignorant of colonial geography ! But he does not stand alone in that reßpect. That high-claim journal the Scotsman, in dealing with .New Zealand finance, has displayed such a want of knowledge of our geography as might have passed for humour had it appeared in the columns of a comic print. After all it does seem that we are so insignificant in the eyes of the world that outside of shipping offices our whereabouts is really unknown beypnd the vague idea conveyed in the term " the antipodes." Perhaps it will have to remain so until we carry prohibition or kill a few champions ! Something the Reader Can't Understand.— Students of draughts columns sometimes drop across a mistake in a problem or a game which appears so palpable to them that they wonder How on earth did the editor miss that?" They would easily find out if they took his place for a while. R. M'Call.— At a pleasant gathering held at tha close of December last Mr Robert M'Oall: draughts editor of the Glasgow Herald, and formerly president of the Glasgow Draughts Association, was presented with a purse of sovereigns and a large and-handsomely mounted photo of the Glasgow Draughts Association Tournament Committee for 1896— a picture which not only contained photos of his late colleagues in office, but embraced excellent likenesses of the champion and ex-champions of the world — Jordan, Wyllie, Feme, and Martins. Mr A. Bryson, chairman of the association, made the presentation, and in the course of a neat speech, said: — "Mr M'Call had some experience of draughts playing before he left school, for he and his chums used to play on their slates, using black and white buttons for men, but he was well into his teens before he studied the came scientifically. What a wonderful list of draughts celebrities he has been acquainted with since then — Drummond and Wyllie, and Martins and Barker, and a host of lesser lights— and how often his services have been requisitioned and cheerfully eiven in events of the Very highest importance ! He has had correspondents in India, in Japan, in Australia, in New Zealand, and even the Fiji Islands. His life for the past 20 years and more might he described as a history of the game for that period in Glasgow and the West of Scotland. And besides doing splendid work in the Herald column, his share in making a noble literature extends to at least two of the most popular guide-books, and to the book of games played between Wyllie and 3Terrie for the world's championship, &o. Almost a quarter of a century is a long period for any man to De connected with the draughts department of a public journal, and Mr M'Oall must have witnessed many changes, both saddening and the reverse. "Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown," and few can realise the contending elements that even a draughts editor has to face from time to time ; and it is only by fearless and conscientious impartiality that he is able to fight and overcome petty spites and jealousies and aißert his independence." Blind Players.— The London Society for (the Teaching of the Blind held an "At home" at Upper Avenue road recently. Prominent among other things were the blind girls engaged In tha playing of draughts, with an almost imperceptible difference in the shape of the black and white pieces to guide them in the moves. The Daily Graphic gives a nice picture of the scene.

Mr and Mrs Malcolm Ross have reached th> West Coast, via the Tasman Glacier.