PASSING NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 3511, 28 June 1921, Page 3

PASSING NOTES.

(From Saturday’* Daily Time*.) The pervasiveness of the rabbit has always been a mystery. Like the rest of ilk ho is an exotic. We may believe if we like in the legendary Acclimatisation Society tiiat brought him in, and, as the story goes, protected him by notice boards offering £5 reward for information leading to the conviction of anybody killing a rabbit. Whether he came m thus, or whether he arrived in a ship of his own, matters nothing. Somehow or other the rabbit reached this country and straightway proceeded to possess it. But there arc other claimants and war has arisen. Itabbit killing is an industry; men get their living by it; dog and gun, trap and poison, are all in action. Moreover the rabbit’s flesh may- be eaten and his skin has a money value ; —there is every motive. The rabbit himself offers no resistance, on the contrary shows a leading mark —- the white tuft of his hinder part, hanging out as it were a poop-lantern to facilitate pursuit in a dim light. The white tuft is a recognition mark, an assistance which animals find useful among themselves. The dog has no recognition mark ; but the dog blazes a track as he goes along, so that another dog coming after, sniffing at post and corner, may know that a friend or enemy has passed that way. Fecundity is the rabbit’s sole defence ; and feoundity, as Maithus taught us long ago, is a vice not limited to rabbits. In the Daily Times correspondence columns appeared the other day a “Father of Sixteen,’’ whether man or rabbit being left to inference. He was demanding a Society for the. Protection of Fathers. So the chances are that he was a rabbit. As things stand to-day, it is a race between the rabbit and the farmer, with odds on the rabbit. Lovo rules the court, the camp, the grove, said Walter Scott; —in New Zealand lie would say the same of the rabbit, with the addition that the rabbit is now invading the newspaper press. Every other day ot late we have had rabbit in quantity served up with our morning paper. Apparently the ruin of the farmer, begun by the rabbit, is being completed by the rabbit inspector. Hence tiiis rush into print with rabbit talk and rabbit wrangle. I may not understand the matter, my suspicion is that I don’t, but what 1 seem to make out is that in prosecutions for not keeping down rabbits—prosecutions under which the farmer may be fined

anything up to £lO0 —everything turns on the inspector’s word and nothing else counts. The condition found by the inspector must be to his satisfaction. How are you going to show that it is to his satisfaction if the man himself says that it isn’t? Disproof is impossible. On this method, perhaps, should all court proceedings be modelled. An alleged “drunk and disorderly’’ is before the court with half-a-dozen respectable witnesses ready to swear that he was sober as a judge. “Evidence of that kind is nothing to .the point’’—says the worthy beak; “the point is that your appearance was not to the constable’s satisfaction.” After which all that remains is—as Thatcher used to sing—-“ Forty shillings and take him away !” Like a plunging shopkeeper selling off at a ruinous discount, Sinn Fein in New Zealand has taken to half-page advertisements: —“Manifesto of the Self-Determina-tion for Ireland League of New Zealand.” Keep it up! If Sinn Fein can find money the newspapers will contrive to find space. And far be it from any newspaper man to discourage advertising ! By way of ground bait for another big fish—possibly a page and a half—let me sprinkle a few remarks on “self-determination” by Mr Lansing, who, -more than most men, was in the secrets of President Wilson, its inventor and sole patentee. Mr Lansing was President Wilson’s chief officer —his Secretary of State. What a calamity that the phrase w r as ever uttered! What misery it will cause ! The phrase is simply loaded with dynamite. It will raise hopes which can never be realised. It will, I fear, cost thousands of lives. In the end it is bound to be discredited. In particular is it bound to be discredited among Americans, for Americans are bound to remember how many American cemeteries it has filled. If the right of “self-determination” were sound in principle and uniformly applicable, the enaea“vour of the Southern States to secede from the American Union in 1861 would have been wholly justifiable; and, conversely, the Northern States, in forcibly preventing secession and compelling the inhabitants of the States composing the Confederacy to remain under the authority of the Federal Government, would have perpetrated a great and indefensible wrong. This is the logic of the application of the principle of “ self-determination.” He continues: “I do not believe that there are many Americans of the present generation who think the South inherently right and the North inherently wrong in that great conflict.” Nor a" generation else will there be any British people so left to themselves as to justify Sinn Fern. Meanwhile let Sinn Fein go on advertising. The more publicity (at the usual rates) the better. There is good reading in this week’s half-page, oh dear ves ! there are the names of half-a-hundred British intellectuals that sympathise with Sinn Fein, and who in years to come will be bracketed with the ninety German Professors that justified the war, and explained away atrocities in Belgium and France as slanders on “our austerely virtuous army.” Also there is the manifesto of seventeen Anglican bishops who cannot sleep because of “reprisals,” and who are headed by the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Baptist Union in protesting against the Bible law—“ Whoso slieddeth man’s blood by man shall his blood be shed.” It was amiable sentimentalists of this kidney who hounded down General Dyer for scattering by rifle fire the Amritsar mol) that had murdered Europeans right and left, and was intent on murdering more. A generation earlier Governor Eyre was the victim ; —Governor Eyre, in Jamaica, had put down a negro insurrection by martial law, hanging for murder, rape, and arson, not even sparing from the rope a negro preacher named Gordon, the Gliandi of the movement. Imagine the bray of Exeter Hall, the hooting and the howling. And if Lord Reading hanged Mr Gharidi—a thing which I am afraid he is not in the least

likely to do—the seventeen Anglican bishops and the Baptist Union would hoot and howl for Lord Reading’s head in a charger. The poets of to-day, poet laureate Bridges at their head, pride themselves on representing “mainly those poetic tendencies which have become dominant as the influence of the accepted Victorian masters has grown weaker.” (Preface to English Association’s book of verse “Poems of Today.”) Expressed in their own style, this pretension may be put thus: The plaintive bleats Of Milton, Keats, Tennyson, Wordsworth, Pope and Go., They had their day In a modest way, But no one imagined They’d come to stay. And now they have had to go, You know, Now they have had to go. I am quoting from an anonymous English satirist who then proceeds to give an example of the emotional sublime which is to supersede the decadent Victorian masters : Soul of the season's song! A panting poem pale I cast Pon pinions pale I poise Like bliss-bom butterfly O’er rose I wreath® —i. In throes. And breathe Each echo’s ecstasy. In phantom fields I dwell, Like love-lorn lily limp or azure asphodel. Dr Bridges, I admit, is more matter of fact than this. “Unflinching hero” he begins in liis sonnet to Kitchener, as though it were the part of some heroes to flinch. Bating the tautology—which would be improved by writing simply “heroic hero”— the epithet “unflinching” is about the poorest compliment ever paid to a soldier. Yet here we have the newer poetry which is to fill an aching void and become dominant, etc., as the Victorians decline. If there is any reason why the twentieth century should be less rich in literature than the nineteenth or grow a poorer crop of poets, it is the existence of this vain conceit. Dear “Civis,” —I have read with interest your opinion of the Australian cricketers, but am astounded at your statement that “the lowest kind of sport is rowing.” From what do you draw your conclusions ? Evidently you have never had the privilege of fighting out the finish of a miio or two-mile race in eights or fours. What aro Oxford and Cambridge coming to when they indulge in the lowest kind of sport? I suggest that you have “come off your slide” and “caught a crab.” Instead of defaming one of the most strenuous and manly sports known, why not give a little attention to the live bird pigeon matches of the Dunedin Gun Club? Stroke. “Lowest kind of sport” is ambiguous. I meant by it that there is less of “sport” in boat racing than in other competitive games. Therein I may be wrong. Anyhow, comparisons are odious; —to talk of the highest or lowest this or that is to talk loosely and hazard offence. In college contests for the “head of the river” there is fun to any amount, but it is mainly on the bank. In the University boat race brute strength is pitted against brute strength; a ding-dong struggle is carried to the exhaustion point ; the skill that goes to it is the skill of a Thames waterman. “Snort” is not easily defined. If we mean by it the excitement of a competition so finedrawn that the event is doubtful to the last, then the University boat race is good sport. There is a boat race in the Fifth Aeneid that satisfies this condition. Of the competitors-, one is a three-decker with three tiers of oars, one hits a rock, the “cox” of another falls overboard. And “Bartimaeus” has a Grand Fleet boat race that thrills you to the marrow. “Stroke” will understand that in making these admissions I apologise. Another form of sport is soliciting us on the cables, the “Big Fight” between Carpentier and Dempsey, dated for next month. Each man has his “sparrers” on whom to practise; we are favoured with the names of some of them—Kid Norfolk, Harry Ctreb. Mike Gibbons. Also we are advised of the latest Wall street betting. Tn which things we are evidently supposed to be interested, —or why arc they cabled? What form of sport is ..a prize fight? Is it high or low? The school fight in “Tom Brown” and the battle royal with the Tinman in “Lavengro” are gems of iitera ture; personally I am not above being amused bv paragraphs such as these which occasionally illuminate the columns of London evening papers : Two soldiers were looking at some antique sculpture in the British Museum. They paused before a headless, broken armed figure, which also had a missing leg. The label announced this remnant of a figure as “Victory.” “Luntme,” said one of the soldiers, “I’d like io see tho bloko that didn’t win!’’

Pat, who had been fighting, arrived home with his left optio badly discolourod. Hh wife.asked him who had done it. ‘‘Mike Murphy,” he replied sadly. “W hat!” she exclaimed. “Do yotl say you let a 1 ttle, undersized man like Mickie Murphy black your eve for you?” Martha. Martha!” said Pat, holding up a forbidding hand, “don’t spake disrespectfully of the dead.” Dead to the world—for the time being. But a prize fight, in which two chartered ruffians knock each other to pieces for money, is quite another thing. George Bernard Shaw has devoted a novel to the glorification of prize fighting. But when lie treats of ethics and social decencies Mr Shaw’s name should be written Pshaw! Considered as a form of sport, prize fighting is the lowest of the low. Great wits jump : Passing Notes, April 16:— Thus, a manifesto by the Triple Alliance: “In addition to calling up the reservists, it (the Government-) had adopted the new and odious expedient of forming a volunteer force against organised Labour.” Dreadful! “Cet animal est tres mediant: quand on 1 attaque il so defend.” 1 don’t see wiiy I should deny myself the luxury of translating :—This animal is "extremely vicious; if you attack him he will defend himself ! London Spectator of same dale, April 16: On Monday night the Triple Alliance Issued an inflammatory manifesto. . Tho Government had “adopted tlie new and odious expedient of forming a volunteer force as an instrument to lie used against organised Labour,” an,] were thus “provoking bloodshed and civil war.” Cet animal est mediant; quand on l’uttaque, il so defend. A neat coincidence. As both contributors to it are talking French, the French version of the English saw with which I flattered myself at the beginning may fitly come at the end : “Les beaux esprit* se rencontrent.” Ci vis.