THE SKETCHER

Otago Witness, Issue 3860, 6 March 1928, Page 73

THE SKETCHER

FIDELIS. You are my harbour from the world’s distress, Where all my argosies safe anchored lie; You are the golden dreamway of my sky, The silvered paths that lead to happiness; Your precious voice my lifting soul’s caress, The very pulse of life. . . That you and I, Y”ou ... I ... we two, we too . . . . must one day die. > . . . How dare we love, thus doomed and weaponless? As creatures caged, whose pacings never cease, Show watchful recognition of their plight, Our eyes betray tins thought. . . . But my release Y’ou are from fear . . . for God in His great might Gave you to me . . . and in this thought lies peace. We love His stars too well to fear the night 1 —Alice Hunt Bartlett, in “ Road Royal.” NOT YET. A footstep on the silent street. Not yet the dawn . . . the city sleeps; An echo in the lonely heart That mourning's vigil keeps. Within the House of Memory There comes an image Life made dear ; Beloved ... is it that I dream, Or are you really here? Here, in this place of ours once more? . Ob, take your part and stay again, For I would render all of life To hear you speak, as then. The footfalls down the silent Tears, The echoes in all lonely hearts'; But how to bear the time with grace When shadows fill the parts 1 —Alice Hunt Bartlett, in “Road Royal.” THE FRITTERING HABIT. Are you one of those who let their money slip away in trifles? I don’t mind confessing I’m a bit of a fritterer myself (says a writer in an English exchange). lhere s one weakness most of we women share—the frittering habit. We simply can’t resist frittering away money on unwanted trifles! That little coloured hanky you saw yesterday, only six-three-farthings— so absurdly cheap—you might just as well have it! The fact that you already possess a couple of dozen perfectly good and dainty hankies didn’t count at all! The pretty little powder-puff you spied Bdtmg on the counter marked at the absurdly low price of ten-three-faithings ' You might just as well have it as not, so you had it! fact that you have, at least, fourteen different powder-puffs at home all much better than your ten-three friend made no difference at all! * * * That blue china bowl, just rmht for sprmg flowers, and only Le and sixyou might just as well have it' You have it! p/iVi d 0! ! S i it matter that you have 24 bowls at home, and finding a place fe°ver a ’ tWenty - fifth will you brain-

That string of quaint beads, only one and eleven three-farthings, and the same blue as your afternoon frock. Really, it’s such an absurd price, you might jus’t as well have it. So you have it! You already have, at least, seven strings ot beads that “go” with your afternoon frock! But does that make you leave the one-and-eleven-three strinin the shop? Not a bit of it! The gay little red lacquer tray—your coffee cups would look so well on, and only three and eleven three-farthings! Really, at that price you might as well have it. You have it !

You have at least four trays that show up your coffee cups Jo perfection, nut does that matter? Not a bit of it'

If we .sat down with a notebook and pencil and wrote out the myriad things ve ve bought like this—because we’ve seen them, because they're cheap, I don’t n.ind wagering that one and all of us would be astounded at the amount of n.oney we’ve frittered away in 12 months!

You wouldn’t, dream of going into a shop and planking down three pounds on, say, stockings. < That would sound colossal extravagance! Yet you spend quite that, and more, on far less useful, and less important things than stockings. You’d simply love to have that fat,' luxurious-looking eiderdown you saw in a window last week, but, of course, it was much too expensive for you. Yet in the last six months you’ve frittered away what would quite easily have bought you that eiderdown! The only thing is.that you spent it in shillings instead of pounds! .. - " ~

Of course, . it’s a temptation to buy j pretty, cheap things. I know all about:, that. I don’t mihd confessing- I’m_a bit of a fritterer myself, : especially when it comes to china.' I - get quite. ing round for a place in which to dqmpy

my bits! So I feel I have a perfect right to tell you what I think about this business. Its absolutely and entirely wrong! .There's nothing to be said for the frittering habit; it doesn’t do anybody any good, unless it’s the shopkeepers. I’ve a bright idea which I don’t mind sharing with you. This is it. * * * Every time you see an “ absurdly cheap ” hanky, powder-puff, blue china bowl, string of beads, or lacquer tray, don’t go and buy the said articles. Instead, have an envelope in your bag, or a little box at home, and drop in it the odd sixpences, shillings, and halfcrowns you are tempted to spend. At the end of three months you will be able to buy that set of crepe de chine undies you have been hankering' after, or that little “model” frock, that silk mackintosh, or whatever else yo:i want and have decided you can’t afford. If you keep this stunt up for a year, you will be able to afford most of the things you want. Have a try and prove it for yourself! HERE COMES THE THIEF. Here comes the thief Men nickname Time, Oh, hide you, leaf, And hide you, rhyme. Leaf, he would take you And leave you rust. Rhyme, he would flake you With spotted dust. Scurry to cover, Delicate maid And serious lover. Girl, bind the braid Of your burning hair; He has an eye For the lusciously fair Who passes by. O lover, hide— Who comes to plunder Has the crafty stride Of unheard thunder. Quick —lest he snatch, In his grave need, And sift and match, Then sow like seed Your love’s sweet grief On the backward air, With the rhyme and the leaf And the maiden’s hair. —Hazel Hall, in the New Reputlm. FERN MYTHS. None of our common wayside plants has been so much neglected by botanists in the past as the fern. Indeed, it is only within the last century that ferns began to be studied and cultivated, having formerly been classed with “ thorns, briers, and other ditch trumpery.” H botanists neglected them, not so the ordinary people, judging by the great amount of superstition with which they enwrapped them. Probably the reason was the mystery involved in their eproduetion in the absence of visible flowers. The Greeks and the Romans believed that the fern produced no seeds. Until the early days of the microscope scientific people were inclined to believe with Pliny that the fern grew without seed, a belief to which Butler in his “ Hudibras ” refers thus:— Fern, that vile, unuseful weed That springs equivocably without seed. Unscientific people were firmly in the belief that the plant brought forth its seed every year at midnight on midsummer eve—the festival of St. John the Baptist—and that the scattering ~f this seed rendered people invisible. Shakespeare alludes to this belief in “ Henry ‘ IV,” when Gadshill says of himself and company, “ We have the receipt of fern . seed; we walk invisible ”; and Manvell writes: — Of the witch that midnight wakes For the fern, whose magic weed In one moment casts the seed And invisible him makes. •

* .. * * All parts of the fern were more or less connected with i.deas of diablerie. When the stalk of the common bracken is cut through obliquely the section shows a marking which in several parts of England is said to be a miniature representation of the devil’s footprint. In the northern counties the young front,- used to be twisted into the semblance of a human hand and sold under the name of “St. John’s-Hands ” as amulet's against witchcraft. The variety called hunaria, or moon fern, is surrounded by another group of myths. It was believed to possess such a singular affinity for iron that it drew the shoes from the feet of horses grazing near where it grew. Culpepper, the wellknown herbalist, tells of a troop of Roundhead horse, under the .Earl of Essex, who lost-all their shoes from this cause which crossing over a Devonshire 1 moor. .. . ■. •. Another variety, the beautiful ; Osmunda fem, which grows chiefly in wet places, is referred to by Gerard, another ?i,oL herbalist, as-“the hearte of Osmund the waterman,” from a legend haying for its hero “ the Waterman Osmund of Loch Tyne,” who hid his family; from the

Danes on an island covered with this species of fern. . Wordsworth, how’ever, in one of his sonnets has turned the waterman into a queen, and writes of

That tall fem So stately, of the Queen Osmunda named. Plant lovelier, in its own retired abode On Grasmere’s beach, than Naiad by the side Of Grecian brook, or Lady of the Mere, Sole sitting by the shores of old romance. Many curious beliefs concerning the fern are to be found in the old herbalists. It was said, for instance, to bear a deadly enmity to the reed; and they cited as proof that the reed invariably perished when the other was planted beside it. On the strength of this, the fern was applied by the old surgeons to all wounds caused by reeds. The roots of some of the species were slightly esteemed as ,i vermifuge, and a decoction of the lady fern was recommended as a sovereign remedy for melancholy in men, but never given to women, as it would infallibly render them -terile. It was also considered powerful against snakes and venomous reptiles. Pliny advises travellers and all those who sleep in the open to make a pillow of a sheaf of fern, or, better still, to make a fire of it and the fumes will serve the same purpose.—W. G., in the Weekly Scotsman.

VENUS OVER CAMBRIDGE. Through the cloister gate when the shadow and silence thickened As the soft division of twilight trembled between us, I watched with the gold half-moon till my spirit was quickened And leapt in my breast to see thee descending, O Venus!

So pure was thy light, so remote, if my eyelids trembled With the heavy unwonted tears that arose thereunder, I felt them not then, for the thoughts in my heart assembled To drink of thee there, though I wept in that hour for wonder.

And I know not whether again (though it may be never) If in/grief and joy and with how aged eyes I may find thee On an evening quiet as this is, and by what river I shall watch thee set with the moonlit heaven behind thee. —Edward Davison, in the London Mercury. CHILDREN CANNOT DISGRACE PARENTS. Girls and boys should be taught to protect their own names, and not that of their parents. Mothers and fathers should be brought to realise that if they themselves have lived good, honourable lives, and kept their names unspotted, what others do—even their own kith and kin—can in no way harm them. With all respect to heredity and environment, the individual is his own architect. ■For our own blunderings we must pav, and no one can force us to pay more than it is in us to feel. Much depends upon whether we encourage a fictitious sentimentality around our names, or train ourselves to take the surprises that are sprung upon us by others with fortitude, how much we need suffer through the actions of those others who bear our name. A great deal of unnecessary suffering has been caused to older folks, and even young relatives, by the erroneous impression that th e wrong and foolish acts of those near and dear to us reflect upon ourselves. Yet, a few moments’ calm reasoning must assure us of the folly of such a belief. If John Brown or Mary Brown are ?ocd, reputable citizens, without a blemish upon their names, nothing any other member of the Brown family can do or say can possibly reflect upon these two. Fathers and mothers who have brought their children up to the best of their ability, giving them that good example which is so valuable to all young folks, can do no more.

Under my own notice at the present moment is a young married woman who committed an act of folly more than a year since. Until recently that act has been hidden from the outside world, but an unscrupulous person who knows of this is blackmailing that wife, whose father is a public character, with the threat that his name shall be' “ dragged through the mire.” Wisely s he at last dared the blackmailer to do his worst, and he has vanished into thin air. I told her that she should have exposed the blackmailer, but one can understand her dislike of doing so. Take the case of an old couple who have cut themselves adrift from all their old friends and acquaintances because their only son embezzled and escaped abroad. The old folks sold many of their treasured belongings and repaid to the fpll, ; but they still feel disgraced.

True, parents may rfbt like to mix with others who may think ill of their children, but it need not prevent them from holding up theii* own heads. One might just as well feel disgraced because a near relative caught influenza'as to take any blame for the wrong step that some relative had taken. Look at the matter logically, you innocent folks who are making yourselves miserable on account of something for which you are certainly not responsible. It is a strangely pathetic fact that when any of us set too much store by what we regard as our good name—usually made good by our ancestors—some member of the family steps from off the beaten track. Albeit, it matters not what wrong or unorthodox thing those who bear our name may do, it is “ up to us ” (as the Americans say) to determine whether we shall suffer through them or take the matter in a philosophic spirit!—Lillie Ross Clyne, in a Scottish paper. L ' ''

HOMECOMING. The mists are all gone And the stars come out bright, But I am not alone; As of old in the night. Were I now but to call To the window above, It would only forestall The voice of my love. Who already has heard That I come, that I come Expecting her word To hasten me home. Her word from above, From the heart of the light, - The word of my love, My name in the night. Edward Davison, in the Saturday Review.

DON’T DANCE ALL THE TIME. Not for the ambitious girl the long, precious evenings devoted solely to dancing and the “ pictures.” She spends two even” ings a week at least in improving herself at evening classes, either in shorthand or typewriting, if these subjects are not up to present-day standards of efficiency, or in fitting herself for a better post by acquiring a language or bookkeeping. In all our towns and cities just now evening classes are held, and the range of subjects that can be studied at them have never been so wide or varied.

Many girls who are engaged to be married (and many who are not!) will, if the” elect to join any of the domestic subject classes, find the study of cookery, plain needlework, dressmaking, millinery and simple upholstery both fascinating and useful. There is no excuse nowadays for a girl to be in ignorance of any of these subjects. She who is getting things ready for her “ Hope Chest ” will be delighted to have this opportunity of making dainty lingerie under the guidance of an expert. And the girl who is not “ much good with the needle ” should welcome the chance of acquiring so essentially feminine an art. Then there are the sick nursing and domestic hygiene classes. Most women at some time in their lives find the knowledge gained at these classes invaluable. For the girl who—moved by a desire to make life fuller and richer—seeks culture and a knowledge of th e arts there are classes in English literature, elocution, and part-singing. One who wishes to cultivate her mind can thus, under wise guidance, dely e into the golden treasury of our national literature, finding incomparable riche s in its poetry and prose, which cannot fail to have beneficent influence upon her daily life. —Nance Evans, in the Glasgow Weekly Herald.

TRAVEL. The railroad track is miles away, An:l the day is loud with voices speaking, Yet there isn’t a train goes by all day But I hear its whistle shrieking. All night there isn’t a train goes by, Though the night is still for sleep and dreaming, But I see its cinders red on the sky, And hear its engine steaming. My heart is warm with the friends 1 make. And better friends I’ll not be knowing, Y’et there isn’t a train I wouldn’t take, No matter where it’s going. —Edna St. Vincent Millay, in “ Second April.” THE FIRST 808. The Victorian novelist loved curls; he made a corner in curls (observes T.P’s. and Cassell’s Weekly). He carried the cult of ♦he curl to such an extent that heroes were hampered with whiskers and heroines-exalted by a thousand stray locks. He created that delightful convention—the girl and the curl. He filled the portrait galleries of fiction with the ringlets of romance. There is an exquisite description of Hetty’s curls in “Adam Bede”; Hetty with the “ dark hyacinthine curves falling on her neck; not heavy, massive, merely rippling hair, but soft and silken, running at. every opportunity into delicate dark rings that lie so charmingly about her ears.”

But, for one heroine with dark curls, hundreds possessed golden. . Fair hair and a pair of blue eyes—“ a straw hat, blue ribbons, and a quantity of curls ” —these were the recognised attributes of Victorian beauty. Laura in '“The Woman in White,” Dora in “ David Copperfield,” Eva in “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” Lady Audrey in “ Lady Audrey’s Secret ” —all boasted glittering hair; but whereas ordinary hair simply curled, Lady Audrey’s possessed the enormous advantage of “ fluffing ” round her head “ like an aureole.” To Miss Squeers, however, must be accorded the first honour of introducingthe bob. Miss Squeers wore , her hair in a crop. It curled, we are told, in “ five distinct rows on her head” a mode of coiffure which, in her case at any rate, afforded a striking example of tho triumph of mind over matter. HER CHIEF INTEREST. Lord Carson told me that his first speech in the House of Commons was nearly being a failure, because he had not been long enough a member to know what was wanted. On being put up to speak on an Irish question he addressed the Hous© in forensic fashion, making little’ or no headway. Fortunately, after he had been on his feet for some 10

minutes, the House adjourned for dinner. During the interval his chief, meeting him in the lobby, advised him to be more conversational. Accordingly, when the House reassembled he changed his tune, carried the House with him, and made a When it comes to ordinary conversation it is still the adaptable man who shines. I remember many years ago meeting my ftyend, Seymour Buslie (perhaps the most brilliant talker of his day) at dinner . He had taken dow-n a lady who was never known to have opened ’her lips in company ; but to my astonishment I heard her not talking but actually gushing all over Busne. On asking him afterwards how he had performed the miracle of making th e dumb to speak, his reply was, " I talked to her about what I knew would interest her most.” “ And what was that ? I asked. “ Herself,” lie answered. So theie is a hint for you ! If you want to make yourself agreeable, don’t talk about what interests you, but what interests the other fellow; and if von let him do most of the talking he will tell everyone what a pleasant fellow you are. —-Healthy, Wealthy, and Wise, by Arnold F. Graves. SHOULDER POSIES. That charming fashion detail, the shoulder posy, instead of growing “ demode,” is now increasing its dimensions (writes Mrs Herbert Richardson in th© Daily Chronicle.) The very newest French dance frocks have huge chiffon roses high up on the shoulder and full enough for their petals actually to brush the wearer’s cheek. The smaller knot of flowers may be tucked sometimes into the low V-shaped “ decolletage ” of an evening gown. But gigantic shoulder posies are smartest wear. It is amusing to find fashion history once again so repeating itself. For the huge posy brushing the wearer’s face was a favourite style of the seventeen-eighties, and as charming with full powdered curls as it i? to-day with the sleek shingle and Etoncrop.

Fashionable women of the period with which the delightfully revived old English opera, “ Lionel and Clarissa,” and the more recent “ Berkeley Square ” of Mr Ralderston and Mr Squire have familiarised us, wore huge posies of real or artificial .flowers, set to one side of their “ bouffant ” corsages of puffer gauze which, again were so different from the slim lines of modern gowns. The high flower petals touched the wearer’s cheek, or even tickled her pearl-set ear, and necessitated an upright carriage of the head aad chin, which gave the prettiest line© to face and neck. Tiny vases of silver or glass, specially shaped to fit inside the stays, held water for real roses and lilies ; and th© artificial flowers were dulv scented, just ag our daintiest posies are to-day. French taste carried the fashion a step further, adding huge knots of artificial flowers to the towering eighteenth-century head-dress. And at a fete given by Mari© Antoinette at the Petit Trianon in 1782, Madame Oberkirch created a sensation by wearing in her hair great posies of real flowers, set in flat bottles which were curved to the shape of her head and hidden among her powdered curls—“ spring amidst the snow,” as a poetical courtier prettily remarked. But even the caricatures did not quite destroy the grace of the eighteenth-century posy—the charm which the wearing of a flower always lends to a pretty woman. One hopes the revived fashion of to-day may long endure, giving one more touch of feminine softness to modem dress. And if the brushing of those high chiffon petals makes for a more ©rect and dainty poise of cheek and chin, the" modern girl will have recaptured yet another charm of which the fashionable droop of yesterday was sadly and inevitably robbing her. THE DEAD IN LIFE. The dead in life. There is a weird fascination about that expression that is not at first hearing suggestive of the deep truth it carries. Truly the world is full of the dead. But they are dead only in the sense in which a sleeper may be said to be dead to all that is going on around. Look at the number of people who rarely lift their eyes from the ground; wrapped they are in dreams of self, dead to the beauties of heaven and earth. Of those who believe themselves to-be very wide awake, the proportion that really sees any considerable part of the great pageant continually being displayed to their unseeing eyes is very small. They may resent the assertion that their eyes are unseeing', but it is easy to test the extent of their grasp of the whole field of possible observation. It is incredibly small. '* People will readily admit that they do not pay much attention to what, they see except in so far as it may interest them personally; but they cannot believe that they really only see a very small part of what passes around them, because they have never tried to cultivate the faculty of seeing, nor have they at all systematically tested the accuracy of their observation, ,as artists and students of nature are forced to do to some limited extent.

When a student begins to use this mysterious power of sight for real observation, he soon becomes aware of his limitations in that direction; and when he has spent a Ifetime in watching certain phases and aspects of nature he knows how blind he really is, though perhaps able to see at a glance more than the average man sees in a lifetime. The student learns slowly the necessity of developing each faculty, of training it and' testing it. Yet the gTieral public takes it for granted that a person, whose sight is not defective, can see without training by merely looking. This is the first. fallacy a student has to be rid of.—-R. Machell, in the Theosophical Path.