FROM THE WATCH TOWER

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 686, 11 June 1929, Page 8

FROM THE WATCH TOWER

By "THE LOOK-OUT MAN,” THE FLYING SULTAN The Sultan of Zanzibar visited Croydon Airdrome and flew for twenty minutes over London. . . . Cable news. The Sultan of Zanzibar takes to the air, To gaze on the sights of the city; The weather is mild and the breezes are fair, And the engine chug-chugs him, a ditty. For full twenty minutes he circles about Over turret and chimney and steeple, Concocting a neat little story, no doubt, To tell later on to his people. . . . And oh, theyTl be thrilled to the roots of their hair, For in Zanzibar no one goes up in the — SQUIDGB. FIGURES TALK Figures, says a newspaper article, prove that women travel abroad more than men. And a susceptible globetrotter gives the assurance that they are often very good figures. * * * PRESERVING THE 'SAFE An architect whose safe was opened by a cat burglar explains that it is better to leave the key where it can be found than to have the safe blown open. Under the circumstances, it seems rather superfluous to have a safe at all. MAL HE MER With a gusty wind whistling round the street corners, Auckland this morning might almost have been Wellington. One felt acute sympathy with those reported to be tossing on the high seas, for of all human afflictions seasickness is undoubtedly one of the worst, and the difficulty about meals that won’t stay put Is that nothing can be done about it. Even an innocuous orange or simplelooking aspirin insists on taking out a return ticket. Such are the bitter memories of sufferers that a screening of the heaving main at the pictures can reduce them to incompetence. A number of people can get thoroughly seasick on hoard a steamer tied up at the wharf. But nothing surpasses the achievement of a gentleman who went into a Wellington steamship office to buy a ticket for Lyttelton, and at once became ill. FOR SCRIBES AND PROFESSORS Dear Look-out Man: “Perhaps you or someone among your readers, say an evolutionary professor, will be able to settle a simple arithmetical argument (the usual boarding-house discussion). It deals with the computation of anniversaries. Last Saturday The Sun noted in an informative article that the following Monday would be the 42nd anniversary of the Tarawera eruption. Yesterday the morning paper declared that the day was the 43rd anniversary of that upheaval. Which was right? With others, I have contended that The Sun was accurate. The eruption occurred on June 10, 18S6. That was the historic event, not an anniversary. In 1887 most of the New Zealand newspapers, on the same date, referred to the first anniversary of the Tarawera eruption. If they were right, then how is it that they can declare with sublime wisdom that June 10, 1929, is or was the 43rd anniversary? Unless there is a catch somewhere, I hold that In the 43 years that have passed since 1886, there have been one event and 42 anniversaries of it. How sayeth our professors?”-—Yours, Tarawera. SKY’S THE LIMIT If Auckland didn't have a building height limit of 102 ft 6in, there is no telling but that some enthusiast might by now have raised a pile almost as high- as New York’s new Chrysler building 870 f- almost the height of Rangitoto. Since earthbound mortals like to see high buildings, and especially to exhibit them to friends visiting the city, this is one reason why many will agree with an Australian architect who says Auckland’s limit is too low. Of course, every architect knows that 102 ft 6in is not really the limit, and that though the parapets were in the first place only supposed to he that height, now the main roof goes up that far, and the parapet is extra, while set-back roofs of one or more storeys, as well as towers, domes, cupolas, and other whatnots, serve to increase the overall height. Strangely enough, it was the New Zealand Insurance building, in course of erection when the bylaw was formulated, that governed the height limit- A thoughtful City Council did not wish to make the architects alter their plans, so fixed the limit at the height this building was planned to reach. For those who believe the limit is too low, it is well that the New Zealand Insurance building had not been planned as a modest four-storey affair.