From My Verandah

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 56, Issue 4056, 3 June 1938, Page 3

From My Verandah

Notes on the Passing Show

By,

ZJ. T. P.

"Gentlemen: The King.” The King’s Birthday will be officially celebrated next Monday by the British nation as much more than a mere holiday. Uttered by such means as loyal message, salute of guns, dressing of ships and the display of bunting is a deep realisation that His Majesty in person and as a person age, is a tower of strength to the realm. The National Anthem, albeit its language has phrases that belong to an older and different time, holds a sentiment and voices a prayer that every British heart appreciates. Be it remembered and emphasised that that for which His Majesty stands is so really a part of our national life that he embodies, supremely and uniquely, the whole British conception of the State. There can be no State without a focus for loyalty, no body politic without a head. George the Sixth, “by the grace of God,” incarnates our national institutions and spirit. It is our Throne that is his seat of honour. The ships that are distinguishably styled “H.M.S.” we munition and man. In “The King’s colours,” is more than personal glory of heraldic device. The judges before citizen causes are pleaded and criminals brought preside by his declared commission and authority, but theii power avails by common consent. “The King’s Writ,” rules according to the popular will. On the coinage cf the country his likeness is stamped, but that will gives it currency. To him allegiance is sworn, knowing that he also has made solemn oath of loyalty; otherwise he could not be named in our covenant. His life and curs, his dignity and the power of the people, are so vitally interwoven that our refusal to do him honour would be to dishonour ourselves. God Save the King! A Modern Atlantis. In the current issue of The Scientific American appears the following: The North Island of New Zealand, noted for its thermal wonders, its earthquakes and its floods, has presented savants with an amazing problem. In the town of Te Awamutu, famed for the fine quality of butter it manufactures, the local authorities and neople are greatly perplexed by the complete disappearance of a strip of land, two feet wide and several chains in length, almost in the centre of the town. It was there in 1924; to-day there is no trace of it whatsoever. Astounding and incredible as it may seem, no earthquakes or other natural upheavals have taken place to account for its total disappearance. Completely' mystified, the Mayor and Town Clerk of the tiny 7 borough have appealed to Harvard University to send out an expedition of investigation. The scientists there arc also completely puzzled, so much so that a party will set out for New Zealand at an early 7 datie to investigate the phenomenon, which, in history, has only one parallel, the quest for the lost Atlantis. Humour and Satire. It is both reassuring and delightful to find the saving graces of humour and sat’-re creeping into the speeches of candidates who are already' wooing the electors in anticipation of the General Election, which according to those courageous or ft olish enough to assume the mantle of the prophet, is destined to provide

“the most bitter fight in the political history of New Zealand.” For instance, bright notes of levity relieved the serious vein in which Mr Jack Jones addressed a meeting at Pukeatua the other evening. Mr Jones: In 1935 the consumption of butter per head per annum dropped four and a-half lbs. when compared with 1931. Now. ladies and gentlemen, what was the cause cf this phenomenal drop ? A voice: Indigestion! The? house forget the serious side of politics and rocked with laughter in which the candidate joined. And a little bird whispers to J.T.P. that Mr Jones in the ensuing merriment forgot to answer his own question in style to the manner born: The Coalition Government, of course! Still there are yet several months left in which to elaborate that aspect. Again, it must have been the true blood of the Welshman coursing in his veins or a profound knowledge of the arts of Britain’s war-time Prime Minister that caused Mi’ Jones to regale his audience with this delectab’e morsel of Lloyd Georgian satire: In the plans cf the Labour Government there was no place for drones—be they called “gentle, men” at the top of the ladder or “scroungers” at the bottom. Mighty uncomfortable must become some of “The Upper Ten,” at thus being relegated, by implication, into the imhnortal category of Mr Semple’s “scroungers’” Thank goodness, J.T.P. is only half-way up the ladder and thus can escape scorpion thrusts of this kind! A Message from the Sea. Into the. possession of Mr H. T. Haselden, secretary of Te Awamutu branch of the Returned Soldiers’ Association, has come an interesting' memento of the Anzacs trip to Sydney. When at sea, some of the Te Awamutu Diggers wrote a message on a cigarette packet and cast it into the sea enclosed in a bottle. The mes-

A Rar a Avis. Mr I. F. Vickers is, metaphorically speaking, wearing a peacock’s feather in his cap this week. At the conclusion, of the Rovers- laupiri match on Saturday last the captain of the visiting team approached the “man with the whistle,” and, in a truly spontaneous manner, ejaculated “Thanks very much.- ref., you are the Lest referee we have played under.’’ The incident. which provides the happy exception to the general rule cf blackguarding the referee, reflected as much to the sportsmanship of the Taupiri skipper as it must have been gratifying to the recipient. It is, indeed, seldom that a bouquet is presented to a referee; his is generally a thankless task, with all the kicks, growls and criticism thrown into the scales as added weight, free, gratis and all-for-nothing. "Bradm an Aga in.” Bradman is again “in the news.’ Not this time as “Bradman Again” scoring a couple of centuries, but because he has suffered the unique ex perience of being booed by English spectators, by failing to make a decent score ag’ainst Middlesex and. lastly, by straining his back and having to journey to London for treatment. In cricketing parlance, he has got “into the news again.” by the occurrence of a series of events reminiscent of “the hat trick” on the field. Not a story of human evolution is the story in truth' of Don Bradman. As Pallas Athena sprang fully armed and with a mighty war-shout from the head of Zeus, so Bradman burst upon Australian cricket as the “man of the century.” Whatever progress has been observable, in his tempestuous advance has not been made by him, but by a slower moving world which saw him first as “a great cricketer,” then as “a cricket phenomenon,” and now views him as a crick-

sage ran: “Cast off S.S. Monowai on return from Sydney. Anzac Contingent, Te Awamutu R.S.A.” .... Some weeks later, Mr C. R. Steer (6/360, 12th Nelson C. 1.8. Main Body), of 12 Jeypose Street, Berhampore, Wellington, was strolling along the Pukerua Bay foreshore, about 25 miles from Wellington, when he picked up the bottle with the message intact. It had floated ashore on a small sandy beach, missing many rugged rocks in its journey. As the letter says. “It seems a bit strange that it was cast off by a Digger and picked up by a Digger.” In characteristic oldsoldier fashion, Mr Steer winds up his communication with best wishes and a cheerio to all the local “Old Boys.” "Come-Back.” To enter the Realm of Prophecy is at once a fascinating experience, even though it be usually barren of material results. Still, realising that curiosity is one of the permanent and certain signs of a vigorous intellect. J.T.P. did, the other day, endeavour to peer into the future. And in imaginative thought he wandered from the stately Royal Courts of Buckingham Palace to the sombre municipal chambers in Te Awamutu. For had not within the last eighteen months two kings abdicated? To a startled Empire, King Edward VIII in December, 1936, announced his renunciation of all his Royal prerogatives, rights and privileges for “the sake of the woman he loved”; a few months later, “King” Montefiore renounced all his Works Chairmanship’s rights and privileges because “the thieving cows of a Finance Committee” had curbed his spending powers. England soon got another King, thus once again proving that no man in this world is indispensable: not so Te Awamutu, for long was the King, non-existent, un-named, unhonoured and unsung. The loyal and liege subjects chafed under the deserved aspersion of being without a Monarch; the regal escutcheon was sadly disfigured; and “The Garden of the Waikato” was falling upon evil days cf decay and disrepute. Happily, the crisis produced the man and King Montefiore once again sits in regal splendour as chairman of the Works Committee. And at that event the people have. rejoiced exceeding great, for is il not a fact that the public, inbued with instincts of true sportsmanlike dearly love a man who can stage “a come-back?” Verily, the repercussions of this event may be world-wide, for if King Montefiore can regain his Throne, why not the Duke of Windsor? The Stately Cow. The Prime Minister has promised a dairy farmers’ conference at Wellington that the Government is quite prepared to have the guaranteed price for dairy produce fixed by an independent tribunal presided over by a Supreme Court judge. J.T.P. wants to deny the statement that the New Zealand Farmers’ Union has got the Government on the run; it has merely got the cow bailed up, ready to milk it dry. Once Hit. Twice Shy. His enthusiasm for the National Game of Rugby undeterred by an incident on a previous Saturday, his Worship the Mayor, who as George Spinley is a life member of the Waipa Rugby Union, was seen a‘ bis usual point of vantage at Albert Park on Sa’urday last, leaning over the fence in front of the grandstand, and taking a keen interest in the Rovers—Taupiri match. Recognising no doubt that discretion is the better part of valour, Mr Spinley, on this occasion stood on the safe side of a onearmed man!

et problem of first magnitude. What man born of mortal mother could justify the words of C. B. Fry: “Adjectives do not describe Bradman; he just does it”? Paradoxes of every sort hover round the head of this man. His paltry five runs in the Middlesex match enhances his reputation almost as much as a double or triple century. For a triple century

tossed off so nonchalantly and with his “carefree ease” goes perilously near his ruin as the exploit of a cricket freak, while an occasional duck’s egg m 1 a five against Middlesex restores his greatness by making him once more a compound of brilliancy and common human clay. Just as well that these lapses occur occasionally, for Bradman has

dimmed the memories and clouded the great names of Grace and Trumper and Hill and other cricket giants cf the past by doing with “joyous abandon” what they had done with grit and inspiring determination. Bradman has driven them all to the boundary with a mighty stroke—and there they lie or sit for evermore among* the spectators.