FROM THE WATCH TOWER

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1074, 11 September 1930, Page 8

FROM THE WATCH TOWER

THE MARINERS OF EX GLAND “It seems possible that the suggestion made by the Prince of Wales to have a putting-green on the sun deck of the liner Empress of Britain will be carried out. The lawn will be irregular in shape, but it will provide a putting area of 200 feet by 12 feet. Gardening, in some form or another, is quite a feature of life at sea nowadays. The idea of a real greenhouse was first of all introduced on the Majestic. The structure is on the upper deck, and here plants are forced into bloom, and even some crops of quick-growing salads are produced.”— News item. The boy stood on the putting-deck. Whence all hut he had fled; His putter had a twisted neck. His touch was sure and dead. He sank his seven-hundredth shot. Then straightened up and said: "I am monarch of all I survey, My rivals are all on the shelf. And here I persistently play Unlimited games with myself. Thank heaven, there’s room on this ship For all sorts of hobbies and chances — A man can enliven his trip With any old sport that he fancies. “The mate is in the greenhouse Spraying off the bugs; The captain’s in the rose-bower Hunting round for slugs; The surgeon’s in the oabbage patch. The purser picks the pea— And so they leave the putting-lawn Exclusively to me. Moral. Ye gentlemen of England. Who sit at home at ease. How little do you realise The perils of the seas! Where seagulls nip the captain’s rose, And bite his best begonia. And blizzards blast the haricots And give ’em all pneumonia! Where anguish grips the ardent soul 'Cos golfers miss their goals so, And many a putt must lip the hole Because the vessel rolls so: LUCIO (in the "Manchester Guardian.”) THE MERMAID Miss Rutter, the girl swimmer who paid a surprise call on the commander of a French submarine two miles off the coast of Corsica, must be an authentic specimen *of mermaid. After spending half an hour aboard the submarine, she dived from the conning tower, and swam to the shore, “where she was spending a holiday.” After completing her holiday on shore, she will presumably return to the bosom of the ocean. A TRUE SPORTSMEN With a note almost of relief, Mr. J. N. Millard, selector for the Wellington Rugby Union, has reported that "although the loss of the Ranfurly Shield was a great blow to the officials of the Southland Rugby Union, they took it in a true sporting spirit.” Which means to say, that they did not mention entering an appeal, or protesting against the light or the referee.. They did not (or apparently did not) allege unfair practices against any of the opposing players, or suggest that any of their own had been “bought.” Lastly, they did not see the obvious possibilities of recourse to law and a Supreme Court action with the object of recovering the shield. All this is so unusual that it is well worthy of Mr. Millard’s remark. Something will have to be done about it. The shield contests are losing their sting. NINETY MILE There is food for melancholy reflection in the observation of Mr. H. Butcher, who is endeavouring to interest speed motor-drivers in England in the potentialities of the Ninety Mile Beach as a speedway, that confusion has been caused by the existence of other Ninety Mile beaches in New Zealand. The Ninety Mile Beach referred to might, to anyone unfamiliar with the country, have been between Kaipara Harbour and Hokianga, or south of Wanganui, w’here the old coastal coach route folio-wed what was called the Ninety Mile Beach, or on the coast of South Canterbury. It is highly probable that besides these three and the real Ninety Mile Beach there are others bearing the same name. No one ever seems to have thought of calling these stretches of littoral One Hundred Mile beaches, or Sixty or Seventy Mile beaches. They are all Ninety Mile beaches, even if some of them are but tAventy miles long. DOWN IN THE FOREST The passion for calling every beach of indefinite length the Ninety Mile beach also extends to tracts of forest. At one stage before the hand of the sawmiller converted forest into farmlands there were Ninety Mile Bushes all over the country. Every patch of considerable forest was either the Forty Mile or the Ninety Mile, and there were so many of them that it is difficult now place the original one. Still, the best claim is that of the Pahiatua district, which had both the Ninety Mile and the Forty Mile. The Nine-ty Mile was the bush of the upper Manawatu basin, and the Forty Mile was the bush between Pahiatua and Eketahuna, which was anciently known as Mellemskov. It doesn’t matter much about these old forest names now, because the forests are gone. But the need for a -system of copyrighting names is still evident. It would be interesting to have a list of the hills that are called Gentle Annie, and the hairpin bends that are called the Devil’s Elbow.