TIT FOR TAT.

Observer, Volume XXVII, Issue 40, 22 June 1907, Page 9

TIT FOR TAT.

(From the Free Lance.) A visitor from Auckland, who takes our hospitality as a matter of course, pays for it thus : — Wellington (By a Beastly Aucklander. ) Oh, city of the wind and of the cold ! Oh, City growing prematurely old'! To call thee but a fraud I make so bold. Thy rags and tatters, Thy cars, to which a fellow haa to cling Like any leech, lest life away they fling. In tact, I must admit each bally thing Illusion shatters. Tho' Wellingtonians brag of buildings great, Of ocean liners emptied while you wait By cranes hydraulic, still, I beg to state That's nought to boast of. In earthquakes they indulge a mighty lot, In weather which ts not exactly hot, And counteracting evils they have got A countless host of. To which replies a Wellington Poet :— . Auckland (By a Gentle Wellingtonian.) Oh, village of the vasty skite ! Oh, township spoiling for a fight ; Well may our progress give you fright, Thou Sleepy Bollowl The cars you growl at are our own (With you the boodler picks the bone!), Under the Pat Man's heel you groan, We will not follow ! Earthquakes we have ; we'll lend a few to you ; Maybe their action will with life endue The sluggish, self-opinioned city, too ! Order them now ! We'll lend our cranes to lift you from the miie, Send some live men to light your mental fire, Till you may to our altitude aspire. Try, anyhow !