CURRENT COMMENT

Taranaki Daily News, 14 February 1931, Page 13 (Supplement)

CURRENT COMMENT

OTHER POINTS OF VIEW / . *

(By

M.O.S.)

The damage done to many of the pianos in Hawke’s Bay homes has, it is said, turned many of the local furniture removers green with envy. * * * * Mr. Bulrush 80-Peep, hy the way, has just returned from a visit to Hastings and Napier. On his arrival at the office he dropped in to give his impressions After waiting in the queue for several days he eventually burst into the editor s room. « ,♦ ♦ * Mind you, he pointed out, he hadn’t any property, relatives or friends over there, but he just thought he would like to have a look. Things certainly were in a mess when he reached Napier. Unfortunately he had not thought to take any food with him, and he had toi boirow some from the ■'inhabitants. Whe » he went to the hotel to book a room He .was fearfully upset, because there wasn’t any hotel. He actually had to spend two nights in his own car. Yes, the ruins were terrible, and theie w no doubt the Central School should not be built in brick. But it was rather fun, watching the special traffic police directing ■ the’ streams of • visiting motorcars down the side streets. Mind you they had had plenty of practice because most of them had been on duty practically continuously since the big earthquake. To think that most of them had lost their business premises altogether, their homes partly, and perhaps a member or two of their family! But it must have been rather fun for them, too, waving the visiting motor-cars down this street and that. # * * * The people looked so forlorn, he continued, camped out on their front lawns. It was all so quaint he thought he would get a few photographs of . them sitting in groups. They didn t seem to like being photographed, poor things. In fact he felt so sorry for them that he wished he coiild. have taken some of them away when he left. Owing, however, to the fact that the back seat of the car was filled up with various souvenirs ■and mementos of the trip, he was unable to do so. * ~ * ■ * ; * jgy jove, though. Those quakes did make you feel sick. At times the car bounced up and down oh the road, ten feet at a time. And the cracks—-they were five feet across, some of them. There was no doubt about it, .the place was ruined. He was sure there were thousands dead. The Government ought to pay for it. There was no question about that. The people ,of New Zealand couldn’t possibly foot the bill. * • # * As he was coming away he, saw a number of tins of fruit iu what was left of a grocery store. No one seemed to own them or to care about them, so he thought lie might just as well have them- as anybody else. So he took them. He ‘ had seen in the paper how somebody had said there were “certain ghouls about who simply battened on disaster.” It was quite true. He thought they ought to get five years’ gaol. . i ■ • * * • “Yes,” said the editor, as he turned to receive the next one in the queue, “Thanks for calling in. Youj; information has been most enlightening. There’s one thing about it; I think it ought to be at least five years before you see another sight like that.” • * * ♦ “Funny chap, that editor,” said Mr. 80-Peep to me next day. “He didn’t use any of the information I gave him. I wonder what he meant by that last remark.” * * * * Perhaps the editor chap was trying to educate him. This life’s nothing but one long education of one kind or another. It is pleasing to see how the United States are showing the world the way in the matter of education, just j.; as they did in the matter of warfare fourteen years ago. “America leads the world in education to-day,” exclaimed a Philadelphian professor enthusiastically. And one had only to glance at the theatre advertisements on one page of a city newspaper'last Monday to see the truth of his statement. * # * * “MIDNIGHT MYSTERY.” “A nerve-tingling mystery guaranteed to thrill the most jaded picture-goer.” Alive with suspense. (Recommended for adult audiences only). • •' • * “SCOTLAND YARD.” “Would , a notorious criminal who, through a miracle of surgery, is given another man’s honoured place in society, including the faith of that man’s wife, keep his secret identity if he loved the woman, or would he insist upon earning the right to her respect and Jove?” #** i ♦ “THE WAY OF ALL MEN.” "A Niagara of human emotion rushing in a mighty torrent of dramatic magnificence. It lays bare the thoughts of men —the hopes of women.” (Recommended for adult audiences only). # * ♦ • “HALF SHOT AT SUNRISE.” “On French leave, with French dames z-turn Paris green.with envy.” . # * * • “CANARIES SOMETIMES SING.” (Recommended by the censor as more suitable for adult audiences only). “It’s terrible, when an old friend falls in love with his old friend’s wife, and his own wife falls in love with his own friend ‘My old father always told me, .have a good time with the ladies, my boy, but always play the game. I don’t know how the hell one ;an do it!’” * » * * And as I saw the crowds of boys and girls emptying out of the theatres where the films “recommended for adult audiences only” were being shown, I realised how true it was that America was leading the world in education.