A NAVY TOAST

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXI, Issue 18332, 26 February 1934, Page 2

A NAVY TOAST

.SB's ■ :ft -S to-*;*! “SWEETHEARTS & WIVES” LOVE OF TRADITION A special corespondent of the Scotsman recently had an entertaining article on the Saturday night toast honored in the Navy, “Sweethearts and Wives.” He has just been with the Fleet. He writes: “I do not know at what period it. became, the custom of the Royal Navy to toast 'Sweethearts and Wives? —a warmer-hearted phrase than the more comprehensive but less personal one, ‘The Ladies' —in a ship at sea on Saturday night. “I have seen it stated that there was formerly a complete series of seven toasts, one for each day of the week, one version of which was.:—Sunday, ‘Absent friends and those at sea’; Monday, ‘Our Native Land’; Tuesday, ‘Our Mothers’; Wednesday. ‘Ourselves’; Thursday, ‘The King’; Friday, ‘Fox Hunting and Old Port’; and Saturday, ‘Sweethearts and Wives.’ “Whatever and whenever may have been the origin of this toast at sea on Saturday night—and origins are notoriously controversial—the custom is still adhered to with that love of tradition which lias preserved many picturesque observances such as might have disappeared under a more prosaic and businesslike outlook. “As far as I am aware only work, weather, or warfare—anything that may interfere, that is. with the serving of dinner—prevents the drinking of this toast. i

“Opinion is, I believe, a little divided among naval officers as to whether there should still be preserved the custom that after the toast of ‘Sweethearts jmd Wives’ lias been drunk, the youngest officer present is called upon to reply: Obviously, as the custom of carrying women on board H.M. ships perished in a bygone age, the toast cannot be replied to by its subjects, if ever it was. “The point which I have heard made is that, in the same way as one does not call for a reply to the toast of ‘Absent Friends,’ it would be more fitting if the toast were simply proposed and pledged. Once again, however, tradition dies hard, and although individual mess presidents may have departed from custom and called for no reply, young officers still, when destiny leads them to do so, shoulder the responsibilities of afterdinner speaking on behalf of sweethearts and wives.

“The main point is, as one can readily understand, to steer clear of the Oharybdis of sentimentality r without wrecking the speech of the Scylla of cynicism. I have no doubt that many young officers have successfully navigated that channel without mishap. Some, I am told—and I heartily sympathise .with them—are not’ so successful, in bringing their wordy craft to the anchorage of a safe peroration. ' “And thus the Royal Navy pays tribute l to the women from whom they are separated, for weeks or for year?,, according to the whereabouts of the Fir et or the' station where they may be serving.”