FROM THE WATCH TOWER

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 669, 22 May 1929, Page 8

FROM THE WATCH TOWER

By

, “THE LOOK-OUT MAN.”

YE HODS! Hods for carrying bricks at the Civic Theatre job have been re-intro-duced in Auckland, after something like 20 years. There is no substitute, it is claimed, for the hod. The shovel shifts its hundredweights of spoil. The tractors do a dozen navvies’ 'work . Man harnesses machinery to his toil, Yet here’s a humble task inventors shirk. Edison dozes, and Marconi nods. They haven’t found, a substitute for hods. Radio bridges oceans and, on wings Icarus might have envied, people fly. The motion picture talks, and even sings, And men will speak with Martians by and by. Yet though we prate of progress, what’s the oddsf They haven't found a substitute for hods. Carrying bricks—of all laborious tasks The toughest: stern the hodman’s lot, and hard. Yet with its compensations, for he basks Within the gracious ambit of the bard, And with due title. Hearken, men and gods ! They also serve (as themes) who carry hods. T. Toheroa. NO MORE BRICK A Following the introduction of hodmen to the Civic Theatre job, the practice of throwing bricks is to cease. This novelty will doubtless interest Mr. F. S. Morton. * * * TYRANTS ALE Our humorous parsons! When the ceremony of “churching the Mayor” was observed recently at Wellington, the service was conducted hy the Rev. J. R. Blanchard, who preached on “The Tyranny of Things Present.” * . * BROTHER JOHN A stoker was before the court yesterday charged with stealing a clock from a Chinese, Sam Hop. Stealing a clock from Sam Hop brought him into the arms of John Hop. It was quite a family affair. THE BIG JOB

Talking of bricks, Dr. E. B. Gunson dropped one at the Hospital Board’s meeting yesterday by suggesting that the chairman’s policy dominated the board. Preposterous, of course! But hospital board chairmen sometimes take such a deep interest in the concerns of their institutions that they are frequently misunderstood. There is one hospital far from this city of sun and sin parades where it is a standing joke among the members of the medical staff that the chairman of the hoard does everything but major operations. * * * THEIR TROUBLES’ Standing in the sun on Point Resolution yesterday, Messrs. Taverner, Sterling and attendant satellites gazed over Hobson Bay and discussed the question of planting railway marshalling yards thereon. Turning to the group of protesting deputationists, the Minister asked: “Has anyone an alternative suggestion to make as to where the marshalling yards might be placed?” A gentleman pointed across the bay to where the white tombstones of Purewa cemetery gleamed on the hillside. “Put them in that bay under the cemetery,” he said. “The residents won’t mind.” 4 * * THE ENEMY Of unconscious errors occasionally perpetrated by the cable-man, the best for a long time came to hand this morning. It illustrates the difference just one “d" can make. In Brisbane the Congregational Union of Churches had been discussing war. Then said the cable: “Mr. Lewis (New Zealand) said no one should vote for Ward, but if the qaemy came within their gates they should resist him.” It sounded much as though the reverend gentleman nursed a profound antipathy to the United Party and its leader. But by striking out that final “d” from “Ward” the message was given a more amiable character. MATES English mail posted on Monday reaches its destination on June 19—yet sometimes people complain of the sluggishness of the mails. There is a man in A.uekland who got a letter addressed, “So-and-So, Queen Street, Auk .” The writer must have been in a hurry to catch the mail when it left Liverpool, and did not finish the word; hut the letter arrived here on time. What of the hardships of war days? Going to England on the transport round the Cape of Good Hope, letters for New Zealand were posted at Capetown. But it was feared that German U-boats were about, and that if the letters were sent back straight away, the dates and the place of possible seizure might indicate how; far the transport convoy was ahead. So the letters waited in Capetown, and were eventually brought to New Zealand by the original transport, on its ■way back from England.