Junior Footballers on Tour.

Observer, Volume XV, Issue 877, 12 October 1895, Page 3

Junior Footballers on Tour.

Football is responsible for a fresh and almost intolerable infliction upon a longsuffering and unoffending travelling public. The epidemic complained of has assumed the form of junior teams put for a holiday, and it is likely to end in bloodshed or something worse, if it does not come to an untimely end in some other way. These teams are chiefly composed of what have been aptly described as little men with big voices. They travel on the local steamers at half-price, take possession of the boat on first acquaintance, and play up old gooseberry generally, so long as they are not incapacitated by sea-sickness. The convenience and comfort of the other passengers is of small moment to them. They are ' the boys ' out for a holiday, and they don't give auyone a chance to forget it.

They flatter themselves that they keep things lively on board the ship. And so they do. Alleged funny songs, with rousing choruses, are their, delight, and it follows as a matter of course that they must be the delight of all the other passengers ; also the aforesaid passengers must submit 'to them, whether they like them or not, and the disinclination of some of the more fastidious to listen to comic songs on a Sunday evening doesn't weigh with the roystering footballers a bit. Like most extremely young men, too, they are exces-

on against the unaccustomed brand of liquor. * * * And, in the morning — but never mind the morning. That carries its own. punishment. These remarks do not apply to all travelling junior football teams. But they do apply in a marked degree to some of them. There is no reason, as far as I can see, why a junior footballer on a steamboat should not behave himself like a rational human being. True, he is out for a holiday, bnt that is no reason why he should destroy the peace and comfort of those who are unfortunate enough to have to travel with him. That he is occasionally a considerable nuisance was exemplified by the remark of a local steamboat skipper the other day. Asked how the footballers on board behaved themselves, he exclaimed : ' Well, if the weather had not come on rough and made them sick, I believe I would have been tempted to scuttle the ship and drown the wholly bally lot of them.' Now, why do junior footballers make themselves such a nuisance ?

— That they are going to have a surplus ' choir at Christ Chnrch, Whangarei. So, at least, a country correspondent assures us.

— That more than one goldmining company besides the Golden Crown will find itself with little or no ground when the surveys are completed.

— That holdings were pegged out, on the occasion of the Karaka rush last week, at three o'clock in the morning. The fight at the Coroinandel Warden's Office for a chance to deposit the license fee was something to remember.

— That there was good reason for the Minister of Lands' sly dig at the Opposition in connection with the Bank of New Zealand difficulties. Some big overdrafts amongst the friends of the party have been disclosed.

— That the old Maori who broke his neck the other day while riding to a taitj/i in the King Country was a forcible example of ' the more haste the less speed.' The old fellow probably wanted to be in time for his share of the ' chain-lightning ' whiskey at the wake.

sively familiar in their manners, and especially so with- the ladies around them, for whose edification they are accustomed to crack their bluest jokes, always accompanying each sally with a chorus of boisterous horse-laughs that are not at all annoying to the sensitive nerves of ladies prostrated by sea-sickness. So, at least, the jovial young footballers would say.

And it is not only on sea that our highspirited young gentlemen make their presence felt. Once ashore, they take possession of the town, and proceed to paint it red in their own amiable fashion. As a rule, they are no match for the average quality of country tangle-foot, and a sixpenny dose changes them in a moment from boisterous lads into bounding buffaloes of the prairies. They promenade the footpath in lines, address broad jokes to every pretty girl they meet, sing the choruses of their most rollicking songs to the alarm of peaceably-disposed people, and finally, when the sixpence worth of tangle-foot begins to take effect, leave telling evidence on the footpath of the internal revolt that is going