FRETFUL PORCUPINE

Observer, Volume XXXVI, Issue 43, 1 July 1916, Page 16

FRETFUL PORCUPINE

ST.S.: —I observed on Thursday last in Queen Street (it was • the day during which money was being collected for dependents of dead sailors) a little lady. She held a collection box, and with extreme volubility was execrating the conduct of a man who had passed. To her companion she exclaimed, "There now! Isn't he a Beast? I shook the box in front of him twice. He did. nothing! I chased him and asked ■■••for only a sixpence. He didn't give it, the mean thing! I ran after him and said, 'Only a copper, then,' but' he ran away. Don't you think, he's a Beast?" "No,"; said the other , lady. " My Dad isn't a beast. He wrote a cheque for £50 for the. Fund this morning, before you were up." "Oh!" said the fair sollector J "Have you given anything yet?" asked Dad's little girl. , "Oh, I hadn't thought of that/explained the collector. "You might think, sometimes," said Dad's Little Girl, bless

her!

The patriotic public may, by the exercise of a little trouble, obtain a chromatic misrepresentation of Kitchener at a low price. A paucity of sales immediately succeeding the great soldier's decease has induced the patriotic vendors to give the public a chance of spoiling any wall at the low cost of Is 3d. The alleged portrait of the great war lord shows him to have been carelessly chopped out of a block of

wood and coloured in the. dark.. It will enrich the associations with which liis honoured Jianie is surrounded when the one and threepenny patriot stands enraptured before the work of art and congratulates himself that it was "Printed in Saxony." As there are but a few loft, we trust that people rushing into print shops to gather in the chromatic atrocity will form queues, so as to render the task of the police loss arduous.

Among the neatest points about modern bayonet fighting ■ie the use of the rifle butt while still holding the rifle by the proper grip. The soldier, holding his rifle at the "ready," takes a step with the left foot, bringe the butt violently under his antagonist's chin,- and, as he reels, slashes him downward with the bayonet. At all our camps this butt work is assiduously practised, and at one camp the finest exponent is an army sergeant-major with a mahogany face as hard as boiler plate. By a combination of circumstances, a recruit whom he was giving individual instruction stepped too close, and, with a clever underhand bump of the butt, "got" the instructor. An officer, seeing the mishap, ran across. "Good heavens, , I hope you haven't seriously injured the sergeant-major." "No, sir," he said, "but I've smashed my butt!"

Soldier:—Admire with me the nice discrimination of the daily press in its report of casualties. There are very many New Zealanders in the Commonwealth Army, and vice versa. To the Auckland dailies a New Zealander who - has the indecency to be killed or wounded while in the Australian Army is an iinconsidered trifle. They are not on the "Roll of Honour." They are mere incidents, "run on" in a string, like horses in a race. They are not even important enough to have the trifling facts as to whether they are wounded or merely killed. They are to the papers merely "names." Of

course, it is right to punish their relatives for having permitted them to go to Australia, a foreign country. I wonder if Australia belongs to the British Empire, and whether New Zealanders in the Australian Army are fighting for the same thing as New Zealanders in the New Zealand Army ?

Signet: —A Wellington paper publishes a list of the sums paid to each reinforcement draft from the canteen funds of Trentham camp since the second reinforcements left. The greatest sum paid to any one lot was £1000. In each draft there are usually about 2500 men, so that each man's portion out of the £1000 woxild be Bs, not a very handsome discount on the purchases made during two months, when all : s sa : d. The newspaper/the Evenirg "Post," claims that the total of about £12,000 paid to the troops in this way is a complete reply to the advocates of State control of canteens. But if the State were running the concern on the same system, the troops would get the profits made at present by the contractor, as well as the rent. It has to be remembered that there are usually two drafts of men and officers and N.C.O.'s of two more in Trentham camp at one time, practically 5000 men. Imagine a storekeeper who was the only one of his kind in a town of 5000 inhabitants! And then say whether the soldier gets all the canteen profits or not. Of course he doesn't. The canteen people themselves say he doesn't. Yet the new drafts are regularly told, on their entry into camp, that all the canteen profits belong to them. A camp canteen should be the last place in which profits should be made from men who are, in many cases, suffering pecuniary loss in going to the war. It is nauseating to think that such profits should be made—and handsome ones, too. The published figures are rather an argument in favour of State control of the canteens. The soldiers are not satisfied with the present canteen system. That should be enough.

The earth is short of cloth—all the mills are making soldiers' gear. The earth is short of leather —all the hide is being swallowed up for soldiers' boots and accoutrements. Everybody is asked to be careful. Just before the war, woman was clothed like an arm in a tight sleeve, so skimpy that something had to go when she stepped on a car. A piece of cloth the size of a grown up pocket handkerchief would suffice to make her a costume when wool was cheap and cloth plentiful. Now war has eaten up the supply, the woman must have a costume that is rapidly crawling back to the crinoline style—a few more yards to give that lamp shade effect are necessary. If a woman can wear 25 yards of kilted skirt she'll do it at present. Before the war women wore, shoes that were just toe and heel—half an ounce of sole and an inch of upper. Now there is a war and a need for economy in leather, it's a poor woman who can't have a boot climbing up her 1 j that is limb. Pro- , ducts are in such short supply that the earth's fashion-mongers are putting ac much as they can obtain into articles of personal adornment. Wouldn't be surprised to hear that because copper was hard to get women were wearing copper blouses or cordite jackets, steel skirts and brass hats. You could get rid of a lot of munitions that way. [

® <® ® ■ Whales are moving northward to warmer climes, and are touching at New Zealand ports en route. The whalers at Queen Charlotte Sound have been having lively times with the big beasts, and. two launches very nearly went below stern first-at the end of a line which had a whale rampant at the . other end. The whales cruise into Tory Channel and scrape the barnacles off themselves against the "old man" rock upon which these ricketty islands rest. Having worked up an appetite, the cetacean^ —which good journalese

—proceed up the Sound, and all would be well with them if they wouldn't blow about it. This hotair practice attracts the attention of the sleepy citizens of Picton, who always become excited when a bull whale stops his propellers off the meat works and lets off steam. Then the dinky little oil launches owned by an. Italian ally of ours, get under way, and the hunt is on. Away goes Blubbery Bill with his harem, and they soiind until even their periscopes are submerged. The launches go straight ahead, like destroyers after a submarine, and sooner or later get a shot at the mountains of muscle and meat. After that, events beat the cinema, they are so fast and sudden. Last week, two launches got lines round their propellers, and were almost lost. But whalers' luck saved them, as it has saved many a boat's crew from Te Awaite whaling station since the days of old Tom Jackson and his comrade Thome. And three of Blubbery Bill's party were persuaded to stay at Queen Charlotte Sound. Blubbery himself will be signalled off Whangamomona to-night.

The prospects of the Panama Canal being open to traffic when the first of the shipping co.s fleet to make the trip arrives there are doubtful, to say the least. Latest word is that another big clip came down in the Culebra Cut a few weeks ago. The Americans may heave the mud out of it in time, but it was. a gamble cutting a huge ditch through' a gully between- two mountains. The crushing weight of these masses, where their bases meet, is terrific, and it is at that terrific point that the canal goes. So the sides of it are always moving, and will be always "moving until the two bases get together again. It's quite on the cards that the Panama Canal may yet prove to be a colossal failure at the point indicated, and a canal is like a chain, in. that it's no use if it isn't the real thing from end to end. Still, let's hope for the best, especially as the bold builders may have a war on their hands.

Old hands may remember Mr W. W. Robinson, who thirty years ago was a pillar of sport in and who still "plays the game" in its best sense. Mr Robinson writes from Wellingborough, England, saying that he has. made arrangement with an English publisher to publish his writings, many of which were published in this paper in the old days. Mr Robinson mentions, among other things, that Sapper Burns, of Auckland, writes regularly to him, giving interesting accounts of the football matches played by New Zealand soldiers in England, the record when ihe wrote standing; 15 matches, 13 wine.

You've never seen the women and children at a naval port thronging the shore waiting for the dread news after a great engagement, or watching with strained eyes the dreadful lists of dead? Perhaps you have not felt the agony that sweeps over such people as mangled men are brought ashore. Oftentimes almost the entire crew of a battleship has been . recruited from the same county or town, so that the sinking of a great ship brings inconsolable desolation to a thousand women and to thousands of children. In all newspaper accounts of naval conflict the man part of a great naval conflict is sedulously forgotten. It is generally regarded as • a matter of ironmongery. We ask you who are far from the dread North Sea to lie awake to-night (we don't care whether you get a wink of sleep or not), and see in your mind's eye the endless procession of sailors' widows and sailors' orphans—the loved ones of heroes who will jump to the word of command no more. Grot the notion to-night that but for the living and the..dead sailor there would be no British shop for you, no British farm for you, no British country for you.

Don't listen to the advertising cocky who begs you not to give to the Navy Relief Fund for fear the fund will be robbed. Give to it! The Navy Relief Fund executive happily calls the Navy "The Empire's Insurance Policy." It is more. It is the Empire's breakfast, lunch and dinner; it is the Empire's undisturbed sleep. It is the Empire's sheet anchor, the Empire's safeguard, the Empire's all in all. And the ironmongery of the Navy is as useless as a bunghole surrounded on all sides with air without the Man. It's the man you're thinking about now—the man who has been shattered for you. It's the woman you're thinking of now—the woman whose man is food for fishes in the stern North Sea. It's the children you're thinking of now—the children of the men who died that you might, live. We don't say it's your duty to give. We say you are permitted the high honour of giving. You want the Navy yet, and you ought to be glad to show in cash what you think of those cheery souls in blue who will never more clear for action.

Lance-Jack: —A question which is perplexing some people in regard to the closing of hotels at six o'clock is this: What are the soldiers going to do to amuse themselves when in Wellington on evening leave when the hospitality of the pub. is removed ? Most of the men are strangers to Wellington, and, apart from the Soldiers' Club, there are no places of amusement and recreation open to them but the theatres and the hotels. In regard to the Soldiers' Club, many soldiers will not go there, because it is a free show, and the young ladies, and old ones, too, who are so kind in helping there, often adopt quite a patronising tone towards the soldiers. Frequently a man will leave a shilling on the supper table when he leaves, simply because he does not want the ladies to think for a moment that their hospitality is charity. They are independent beggars these Tommy Fernleaves. The hotel bar is a social centre where much harmless recreation is found', and the closing at 10 o'clock is a pretty effective bar to drunkenness. When the bars are closed, where will the soldier turn? Well, there are women and girls in Wellington and in Featherston and Greytown, and they will find themselves even more sought after, if the hotels close at six. A man has to do something, not being a plaster saint. Much better to close the bars at 9, and send the troop trains home earlier.

© © © , "Smiler" Hales is hitting up Lord Milner in Home newspapers. When Kitchener was drowned, the Old Country looked round for a man to fill his place, and' a whole heap of folk yelled "Milner!" "Smiler' rushed into the breach to say, "He is not only German in origin, but German in thought." As a matter of fact, Lord Milner was actually born at one of the founts of German Bonn. He is not ■only German born, but he was schooled in the Hun country, but, of course, afterwards at King's College (London) and Balliol (Oxford). Milner was. a journalist until lie took to politics, and anyone who is familiar with - his writings of the 'eighties will remember how all his mental processes were German. It seems reasonable, too, for he was private secretary to George Joachim

Goschen, eldest son of Wilhelni Heinrich Goschen and Henrietta Ohnian, British Chancellor of the Exclieciuor, who was no doxibt related to that other great British imperialist Charles Hermann Gosohen, director of the Bank of England. Yes, yes, he certainly ought to have Kitchener's job, run in conjunction with an agency for Fruhling and Co.

Staff Quartermaster lan A. Mackay, at present at Featherston Camp, is the same young man who, at the age of eighteen years, became editor of Rotorua "Chronicle" and subsequently editor of several other papers. Lan, who is the son of Mrs Mackay, of Parnell Park, and brother of Miss Mona Mackay, -vrho writes such excellent verse*.has been "turned down ,, by the military medical authorities thirteen times. It's the eyesight, and, of course, a journalist with his nose to the writing block for a few years night and day doesn't only use his ears to see with. One eye being defective from birth, lan has, however, succeeded in becoming an excellent shot. He is not, one understands, permitted to #o to the. front, but will remain on the camp staff until the dove of peace settles on the housetops.

"Mapleleaf" :—Many of the hardships public men endure might, I think be traced to sinister influences. For instance, what a local v author refers to as "an awkward contretemps" occurred at the Grafton Library when Mr W. A. Beddoe, Canadian Trade Commissioner, spoke on "Can Germany Win?" Mr Beddoe had left no book unturned to gather material for this lecture. He had searched the authorities, and, with a subject covering so much he had necessarily written it, relying on his oratorical power to lighten the text. At the most interesting point of the lecture, when he was apparently about to give his own personal opinion on the reasons why Germany must lose, the light went out. Considering the intense preparation required, the fact that Mr Beddoe had invited many of his friends, an investigation into the reason for this sudden cessation of.material light are necessary. Mr Beddoe was happily able to retain the complete interest of the audience by an impromptu lee-

ture on Kitchener, for whom no notes were needed, I trust the management committee.of the Grafton Library will bring 'the culprit responsible for the outrage to book.

Tlio official New Zealand war correspondent, in sending a glowing account of a small sample of trench warfare in which New Zealanders were engaged is good enough to say that the Anzacs don't want a lot of fuss made in London about these small conflicts. "Which is probably true. The French and the British Armies have been doing this sort of thing with as much regularity as one takes one's meals. The misfortune, of course, is that in London there is a small clique of typical claquers who seize the veriest trifle and exaggerate it into an affair of unparalleled heroism. The fact of the matter is that the whole existence of any soldier, to whatever army he belongs, is a daily record of heroism. Stray New Zealand journalists in London very wrongly discriminate between the deeds of the British soldier and the deeds of the colonial soldier. It has led to ill-feeling and quarrels before, and will do so again, especially as the colonial soldier gets three times the pay for doing the same thing.

An authority remarks, "The acute shortage of petrol is making mQtofc owners Jay in. enormous Apropos of which, other remarkable samples of the same thing: "Owing to a lack of the Germans are eating enormous meals." "AsJbhe whole of the countryside has Been denuded of timber, the people are burning huge wood fires." "An entire absence of milk in Mesopotamia has reduced the population to the necessity of living on butter." "The Austrians are without money. This accounts for the freedom with which they are spending gold."

Drill terms proved somewhat elusive to a country laird who had obtained a commission in the old volunteering days. However, he usually did manage to get things done. When "Rear rank forward" escaped his memory, he would shout: "Back raw, staun furrit"; and for "Right about wheel!" he substituted "Noo, lads, come round like a liggat"; —a liggat being a gate that closes without assistance.