PASSING NOTES.

Otago Witness, Issue 3611, 29 May 1923, Page 3

PASSING NOTES.

(From Saturday's Daily Times.) If you make a holiday jaunt and somehow miss the best of it, that—in Italian talk—is to go to Rome and not see the Pope. On the lava fields of Vesuvius, hot and smoking after an eruption, men appear with a hand barrow and otfer to carry' you—not up the cone (there is a “funicular” for that), but over further stretches of burning marl to parts that are hotter and smokier. When you decline, they say in remonstrance : ‘‘This s like going to Rome and not seeing the Pope.” And indeed for the every-day tourist, what else? To see the Pope would cost him official introductions and a world of trouble. When the Italian King and Government came to Rome the hope in dudgeon shut himself up. It is true that the Vatican affords him ample elbow room—scope and verge. The Q ll ■ final, abode of the King, is a stately palace; but by the side of the Vatican, with its 4422" rooms, the Quirinal is . a cottage. Under conditions, .the everyday tourist may get into the Vatican. Wandering through its labyrinthine halls and galleries, corridors and staircases, he may possibly run into a cardinal, but that is the limit. Hidden away and guarded well is a sanctum sanctorum which no casual foot may tread—a many - chambered palace within a palace. And there enshrined abides his Holiness the Pope. That our English King and Queen should go to Rome and not see the Pope, they of all people, would be a thing beyond reason—in the classic language of Dogberry a thing most tolerable and not to be endured. The Protestants who protest are overdoing their Protestantism. What are they afraid of? Is King George thought to be weak in the faith—the Protestant faith? Is there a risk of his “going over ? The last English king that “went over”—his name not George, but James, a Stuart not an Han overian—lost crown and kingdom. King George is quite as good a Protestant as he needs to be; and it would be an indecency if he and the Pope should be m the same city and not meet. Meet they did, and the churchman received the king with all the pomp and circumstance at ins command. What they said to each other we are not permitted to know. But it is pretty certain that the Pope would not touch on the wrongs of Ireland, nor would King George broach transubstantiation or the power of the keys. Nothing but the most considerate courtesies on both sides. 11 Of course King

George is a heretic; but then the Pope is a gentleman. As much has been said of the Prince of Darkness. “Dancing is not what it used to be.” So the beldames in a once popular opera. So also, without contradiction, they of our own generation. And the reason? Evidently' internationalism. An international meeting of dancing-masters at Paris holds its own in the cablegrams with the Women's Congress at Rome and the Lausanne Conference. To the long list of international problems is added another—overmuch proximity in the dance. It is not insoluble. Professor Rossi proposes that ladies wear a thin metal belt, having in front three large protruding buttons shaped like buffers on a railway train to keep the male partner at least three inches away, the belt to be covered by silk ribbons matching the wearer’s dress. “Proxime Accessit.” Great inventions astonish the world by their simplicity, l'erbaps Professor Rossi will rank among the immortals. His name will be recalled wherever the dancing-buffer or the Princess Lily belt is mentioned. He has the Church behind him. “Priests say that it is an excellent invention.” Modern danc ing seems to become an obsession in its devotees. Sallust speaks of a lady who was “wont to piav and dance more skilfully than is necessary in an honest woman.” Diogenes said concisely of a young man that danced decently—“the better the worse.” Other tiroes, other manners! “Community dancing” may be the next development. The “cheerio men, the world-brighteners, must see to it. Professor Rossi and his buffers silence the voice of criticism. Dear “Civis,” —A few weeks back you were pleased to vent your sarcasm on a letter of mine in the Times on loyalty. As the ire I aroused in your worthy breast has by this time "probably abated, and your loyal and do voted self has probably forgotten that, “a human oddity” ever existed, I would like to humbly approach you and ask your opinion of the farrago of mush that Mr Massey has despatched for the edification of a British crowd on Empire Day. Surely you wall permit me the pleasure of a slight snigger when I read in the aforementioned “patriotic message”: “Freedom of thought, speech, and action, illustriously won,” etc., etc Sounds awfully nice, do you not think so? Truly the minds of the great on these auspicious occasions turn to water and pour over the most idiotic clap-trap. Phew, I wonder what Mr Massey would do if I were to climb on to a public platform and put mythoughts into words. “Freedom or speech”—pah—what hypocrisy ! A II UMAX Odditt. Bravely signed! An excellent signature ! Pleased to be reminded of the existence of “A Human Oddity!” Glad also that he has survived the mortifications of Empire Day! Nor would “Civis” grudge him his quiet snigger, for Mr Massey would appreciate the joke. Human oddities are expected to laugh in the wrong place. Permitted to them is >, “freedom of speech” that becomes license in sober men. It pleases them sometimes to thank the gods that they are not as other men. Let the candied tongue lick absurd pomp And crook the pregnant'hinges of the knee Against prejudice no argument may prevail. This amiable correspondent musthave his “farrago of mush,” arid trail the tail of his coat . There are things which lambs cannot forgive nor worms forget With “Human Oddity” it is chronic, as with Mr Pecksniff, who would have none weep for him. Men of the mid-Victorian time were of freer speech than the men of to-day. In “Pinafore” the ruler of the Queen’s Navee makes his boast: “I never use the big, bid D.” “What, never?” “No, never.” “What, never?” “Hardly ever.” But men such as Lord Randolph Churchill and Sir William Harconrt could hardly get through half a dozen sentences without that regrettablo vulgarity. Even Mr

Ruskin ! —the evidence was in this column a few weeks back. But the men cf the generation that went before were worse. A correspondent asks me to note a passage in a gossiping book of “Recollec tions,” by Sir Algernon West, who was private secretary to Mr Gladstone : One day at dinner Harry Keppel, who came, to meet- Mr and Mrs Gladstone, told us that when he was taking I,orcl Saltoun as Commander-in-Chief to China, he asked him if there was any trut-li in the oft-repented order of the Duke of Wellington, “Up, Guards, and at them !” at Waterloo. He said “ None,” and he ought to have known, for there lie had commanded the light companies of the 2nd Brigade. He was standing by the Duke when the- Guards were lying down, and he heard the Duke call up an aide-de-camp and give him some orders which he galloped off to execute. On his return he saluted the Duke and fell back to the rear. In a few minutes the Duke called him up and said: Did vou deliver my orders to General ?” “ Yes, ycur Grace,’ 8 said the aide-de-camp. "And what did he say?” “ lie said he’d see your Grace damned first.” The Duke took up his glass and looked in his direction, and leant over to Lord Saltoun, saying, “By God he's right.”. An incident of Waterloo one wouldn't care to miss—-the humour of it, aimd a/I the ghastly tragedy of the hour. But that is not the point, The point is that emphasis was got bv what we call swearing. Defective education. Vv e have now learned that all the emphasis 1m aginable may be had without curse words, and that to talk as the soldiers, and even the statesmen, of the past talked is bad form and sheer vulgarity. On the use of “who” and “whom” discussed in this column last week, that guide for doubters (“Ductor Dubitantium”) —“The Kings English”—the read ing of which left Andrew Lang afraid to put pen to paper, abates its customary vigour and rigour. A distinction should be made between conversation written or spoken, and formal writing. Marty educated people feel that in saying “It is I,” “ Whom do you mean?” instead of “ It’s me,” “Who do you mean?” they will be talking like a book, and they justifiably prefer geniality to grammar. But in print, unless it is dialogue, the correct forms are advisable. So we may say, “It’s me.” For this relief much thanks. In the Jackdaw of Rheims,” when “heedless of grammar they all cried ‘That’s him!’ ’ they were entitled t-o be heedless, and had grammar enough. In conversation “Who do you say? ’ “Who do you think?” “Who do you want?” and other “Who’s 8 under transitive verb, are allowable. Substitute “Whom,” and you would have not English, but Ollendorf. You would not even be talking like a book. i_ ou would talking like a pedant. On the subject of toothache (distracting theme !) —from a Coue handbook of practical directions: If you are suffering from any severe pain such as toothache or headache, sit down, close your eyes, and assure yourseif calmly that you are going to get rid of it. Now gently stroke with your hand the affected part, and repeat at the same time as fast as you can, producing a continuous stream of sound the words “It's going, going going—gone !” Keep it up for about a minute, pausing only to take a deep breath when necessary, and using the word “gone.” only at the conclusion of the whole proceeding. At the end of this time the pain will either have entirely ceased or at least sensibly abated. So simple, so easy —but how belated ! Toothache has been a torture from the days of the cave men downwards; not a single human being can have escaped. Listen to Robert Burns—raving, ramping, swearing, stamping: My curse upon your venomed stang, That shoots my tortured gums alung, An’ thro’ n:y lug gies sic a twang, Vi’ gnawing vengeance, Tearing my nerves wi' bitter pang, Like racking engines! And yet all that he need was to sit down, shut his eyes, and say “Going, going, gone!” We are familiar with dentistry without pain. In the supreme matter of toothache we have now arrived at den tistry without dentists. I encourage correspondence. And from all parts of New Zealand I get it. Some of my correspondents shoot their arrows into the void, or may think so. As the prophets of Baal appealing to their goo from Mount- Carmel, so the}' —there is no voice nor any that answers. res, 1 confess a waste"-paper basket ; I didn’t like to mention it, but the receptacle is always there. It should be understood that letters addressed to this column may be lopped or stretched or dissected and dismembered, turned upside down or inside out ; or may be consigned simpliciter to the limbo of vanities. La Mort sa-ns phrase. Sometimes I am asked for the answer to a prize conundrum in the

double rule of three. Here is a letter, dated Waikoikoi, beginning “Let x ’equal 1 y equal minus 1,” proceeding through seven lines of algebraic liocua pocus, and bringing out the result: “Then 1 equals 2.” Will I kindly explain I have no other explanation than that the linotype is incapable of algebra. This inquirer should get at the nearest library and ask for I)e Morgan’s “Budget of Paradoxes.” A specimen letter of another kind I print just as received: Dear “Civis,” —Will you kindly tell me this in your next issue? Supposing a child has an English mother and a Scotch father, do you think it would be silly to dress the child in Scotch clothes? Where can one get the proper tartans, please? Does otie buy the suit all complete or hare it made? It would ill become me to pronounce on domestic questions difficult and delicate. My modesty is that of the Scottish flams when asia J is she understood the sermons of her favourite minister: "I wa'dna pieshume.” Civis.