CURRENT COMMENT

Taranaki Daily News, 20 December 1930, Page 13 (Supplement)

CURRENT COMMENT

(By

M.O.S.)

/OTHER POINTS OF VIEW;

■ Being i few current, comics about fairies, duotas and'moles, 'in which the intelligent and discerning reader may. see more (Deo wlente) than' immediately/, meets the eye; the whole concocfti-on. being rather like a Christmas pudding of which one patiently eats large •nd . weighty slices in the hope that one may perhaps find' here and ’there * a ’ threepenny ’ bit. ' It is frankly, confessed that, owing to the presence ■ of, the .Christmas season, • truth has z ‘ baea. strangled and logic defied to glre lo each Ifttie ’fable a /happy '.endtag. •_.. ■ There was once upon a time in New Plymouth' a group of. Jairies dr rather elves, .because, it rhymes better with their- motto which ia: .' < : Weare happy little elves, ' . Helping others not/ ourselves.: ' ’ .• ■ Anil' the fairies .decided ;they would build a lovely pond in the hills a few . miles, away from the town. So they1 : collected' a "lot' of stones 'and 'built a i great—i which is. a very wicked word, children,, that youmust not repeat* llBui; bad jpeople' ; said, /'Oh, -that’s no

* , good, it/will go’,bring,” which , isi a common way ofr saying its foundations are insecure. '■■'//■';/ '"/■: / '.?/./; ’" ■?' /.'lt. to happened that’ : ’a, foreign fairy had strayed into the' land, and- he was said to know a great deal about pools. •So the eight good fairies said would he go out and have a look at the pool. He said yes, if they would give him a bag /’ Of gold. ’ "‘/ ” , ’/":' ,Sb they took him put. for a picnic one day. to see the thing with the wicked name and he looked at it and said he ’ , wquld write them a letter about it,when he got home but not till he got home, because distance; lends enchantment, to . thp view.- But afterwards, when ?he had ■ gone, everybody eaid, “That’s a fat lot ' of money to. give.'la joker, for a . day’s work,” meaning is that not rather, an • exorbitant sum to pay for the advice of ; any man - even if he. is: an expert? . So'the eight good-fairies had a meeting about it and-put it in the paper. Each of them said, “ \Vell, people can say what they like but 1 am sure it was a , good thing to do;” except, one. That ■was Brown-Owl who said he didn’t like ■■■ clever, foreign fairies—never could and never would and;never had and never .just like poetry. So Fairy Stay-xri-Towii said, “Why didn’t you stop us from giving the bag of gold then?” But Brown Owl was not a boxing man and ; ? hfr did hot want a fight so he just-said some more about, what he thought of clever' foreign 1 fairies generally?; ,iri-time all this came to the’cars . of. the; foreign fairy, who was milch distressed about-it',and.very.sorry to think ; liet had caused such"-trouble? So he wrote '/' a, nice- letter .to the- eight good fairiep / ap’d -told them ' all. about the pool and ?■’! what to do about it; when, .it ..grew up and,so on. - . And he said he would give them back

the £1200; lie didn’t want it anyway., . V Hot so long, ago there were chosen out ■ of all the birds in Taranaki eleven particular birds,who were called the first eleven. They were very fond of a game 1 iin which you hit, if possible, ayball with 'a bat. , When, they were chosen people ■ .said, “Oh,, they h ill all turn out ducks.” But they played a -game-.with eleven other-birds from Wanganui and won it. :'• This;!'was rather a feather in their • tails, so they sent- a challenge to eleven other birds in the Waikato. In the - ’ course of . time, migrating- to a place '• called Hamilton they had a royal, battle ! . with Eleven other birds! of that .(dintriqt ■ and came;home ■ with a cup (l given, by' a •'bird ; called Hawke. So people said, “They can’t, be ducks, after all and even - : they are ducks they are quite superior , \ ducks, tin fact - they must, be Paradise ducks.” And afterwards they played ■ a game in Pukekura Park, New Plymouth, against eleven other birds who had: migrated to Taranaki to see if they could win the cup. The match was held / on Saturday. ' j ’ ■ ; - And-the attendance, was/15,000. ’ •• /.vy » ;■’ /*' //: ’ * . ' ' '■< . AUXfyer.New Zealand and particularly ipjentjful in the province of Taranaki .huanber of‘moles who 'worked in all/day Jong and, so ,they .said, paost of the night as well. Although they lived close to Nature and enjoyed, as the poets say,, the fresh, air and the running brook and the good strong smell of earth, they were not happy because they considered they were being badly treated. Frequently they Aaid, “We are the foundation of ‘ the country,” , and perhaps they were Hot "■o' Very far wrong. . .’ • Against the injustice of /’their Jot these moles held a big meeting •' Wbich- they called a rally at Hawera, ' which ;is known. in the south as the capital of Taranaki. There, forgetting fqr , once ihe\ fresh air, the running brooks, the good strong smell of earth and the other curses of their lot, they . had ■> very- nice time sitting in. a large room ■all day. It is quite likely .that ‘ they would , atill hp.ve been there if they had not to go home io milk the cows. . And some people.«ay that one of the reasons why Brovjdence put udders on. cows was to make sure that moles 'would have to ■top their meetings some time or other. < Well, they. had a lovely day discuss- - fM- the phenomena of natural history, j ' They talked all about octopuses and how'they will fasten on to unsuspecting moles and sap, the life-blood out of the mole community. They talked about pyramids standing on their heads right on top of poor little moles arid crushingvtjiem to death. And they talked about moles being the backbone of the country and getting curvature -of the : apine;' .. i (Finally they took a lot of 'planks and built a platform and ultimately they •howed this platform to the politicians <nd said if the politicians would not support it they, would never vote for one of them: again. And all the politi-' dans in the land said it was a very nice platform. one of the nicest platforms lbw had seen and they would uphold ft come what might through thick and thin. Then ajl the moles went back to their farms and worked hard. And butter-fat went up to Is Sd a pound andVool went up to lOd and meat went up' to something, but I don’t quite know ■ whnt jmeat goes up to. So the .were, content with their lot. . Arid next session all the politicians . Were jjts good as their word. - ,