AT THE TEA TABLE.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XLV, Issue 11927, 22 October 1919, Page 5

AT THE TEA TABLE.

SOME TOPICAL TALKS. “The Dutchmen seem ‘likely to make profit out of their German neighbours,” remarked the Serine. “Possibly their neutrality during the war may have been influenced by hope of spoil in the future.” “You wifi notice, ” said the Critic, “that they are a cautious people. They are lending the money, of coarse at a price, but they also insist on Germany exporting ' a proportion of its manufactures to improve trade.” “They are proverbially a cautious people,” remarked the Sage, “hut «ven they have had their fits of frenzy. „ Once they went mad over tulips, and many fortunes were made out of the bulbs while the lunacy lasted, and many people went bankrupt after the collapse of the boom. It was like the British South Sea bubble, Jbut on a smaller sealo. In the present instance they stand to wni. ”

They seem to be a lawless lot up in the Northern Territory of Australia, ” remarked the Spinster. “They practically d<- y the Government and expel its officials.” “That,” said the Critic, “is one of the outskirts of civilisation, where the refuse of the nations drifts—one of those places that Kipling must have had in mind when he wrote ‘Ship me somewhere east of Suez, where the best is like the worst; where there ain’t no Ten Commandments, and a man can raise a thirst.’ They feel more comfortable there without the restraint of law.”

“We once supplied them with a strong man in Professor Gilruth, ” said the Sage, “but even he found it impossible to administer affairs satisfactorily. The Federal Government are evidently not regarded as likely to punish the offenders, though they are making a show of establishing Mounted Police and talk of sending a warship. This, however, is only likely to precipitate trouble with the Labour extremists in the Commonwealth.”

“Were it not that one does not wish to see the aliens obtain a footbold outside their own domains,” said the Cynic, “one could wish tha t torrid land peopled with Ghinkios, Japs., or Hindus. It would prob'' ;y produce far more than it ever w o hy means •Of a white populc particularly as such a large >- portion of the lawless at present infest it. ! 1

“I thought that old ago cure of Yoroneff’s would lead up to something disagreeable,” remarked the Landlady. ‘ ‘lt was bad enough to be threatened with injections from goats and monkeys, but the notion of taking material from dead humans before their bodies are cold is ghoulish and repulsive. ” “‘The cold-blooded scientist even suggests cold storage for the dead till it becomes necessary to use t a cadavers,” said the Cynic. “T

prospect is calculated to make t, sensitive shudder at science s latest.”

‘ ‘lt seems to me also, J * said the Sage, “that surgical or medical practice on the lines suggested would open np some dangers. For instance, the supply of accidentally killed might run short, and this might tempt the needy and enterprising. It also makes one think of the doings of those witch doctors who practise on the credulity of natives in. heathen lands. In the horrible rites of Obeah, still practised surreptitiously in Jamaica, portions of the human body are used. Tae savages seem to have been the forerunners of Voroneff. ”

“I think,” said the Scribe, * f that most people will prefer to bear the ills they have rather than resort to the gruesome panacea of that foreigner. ” “Now don’t use the term ‘foreigner’“in a tone of contempt, 7 ' said the Cynic. “It you were in his country you would he a foreigner. As for the rest, the medical profession will doubtless go ou following the old practice of striving to maintain good health, and chock the inroads of disease. In the meantime you cannot do better than, in the slightly paraphrased words of Wordsworth, pray for ‘an old age serene and bright, and lovely as a Lapland night, to lead you to your grave.’ The one will somewhat depend on your physical conduct, and the other on yonr morals. 7 7

“What do you think of that twoup episode in WayganuiV” asked the Spinster. “I notice that the police were commended on the skill they displayed.” “1 think the whole affair was pitiable, 7 said the Sage. “In the first place it is sad to know that some men are so little able to entertain themselves]tbat they must congregate to try to fleece each other of money which may have been hard earned, or which some can ill afford. to lose. It is also not satisfactory to realise that while this, though foolish and reprehensible, is not a crime, it has been created a crime by man-made law, which has driven vice into secret places. It is regrettable that men do not devise some more attractive means of recreation. It is also to be regretted * that the nets of the law are so curiously and almost magically constructed that the meshes let the big fish through* and only secure the minnows. 77 A JAYE PENNE.