PARS ABOUT PEOPLE

Observer, Volume XXXIX, Issue 49, 9 August 1919, Page 4

PARS ABOUT PEOPLE

THAT 'well - known Anglican divine, Rev. W. E. Gillam, relinquishes the charge of St. Matthew's, and as a sporting parson declared "Jasper has a two to one chance of getting it.,, Ah essential feature of the retiring gentleman's clerical career seems to be left out in the valedictory paragraphs of local papers. The rev. gentleman was, when he first went to Christchurch, the pastor of the Bedford Street Wesleyan Church, in Christchurch. The position the rev. gentleman is vacating is perhaps the best in the diocese, carrying £400 a year, a free vicarage, etc, which with other emoluments, possibly represent an income of £500 per annum. It is hoped by those who so greatly esteem the retiring gentleman that the clerical pension of £150 added to the parish retiring allowance of £50 with local tenens work and a secretaryship will enable him to live comfortably. Mr. Gillam has been spared during two years of war to act as a military chaplain to the New Zealand forces on board H.M. troopships.

There isn't enough "strafe" among British troops and German people on the Rhine to kill a blowfly. Mr. J. Saxon Mills, writing from Cologne, says this :—.

"I admire and respect the unconscious magnanimity of the British soldier as I see him to-day in these towns and hamlets near the great river. He has done his task. The most ruthless military despotism of history lies humiliated in the dust. But the soldier can distinguish between Government and people. He does not look for the brand of Cain on the foreheads of these innocent children, kindly-hearted women and girls, and honest, hard-toiling peasants, in whose homes he now makes his bed. The British soldier has settled down among these German folks as a human being among human beings. He has no "top-dog" manners. Here, as everywhere else, he is homely, easy-going, rather absentminded, and, without intention or effort, he has crept into the hearts of hundreds and thousands who, at higher bidding, have sung hymns of hate and "strafed" England during the years that are past.

That vivid parson, Rev. H. 0. T. Hanby, of the dark eyes and the executive ability, who has been in charge of the Church of England Rest and Recreation House for turned Soldiers, has resumed duties as Vicar of Fairlie.. Mr. Hanby used to be a reporter on an Auckland paper and still loves the smell of printer's ink. He met with a most serious accident by which he lost a leg, and although he desired to go on active service the disability prevented him.

Don't know whether Auckland Anglican clergy, who very justly "want their wages riz" have heard about the poverty of Dr. Arthur Foley Winnington Ingram, Bishop of London. Dr. Ingram is an intersiational eminent and one of his most notable achievements outside Britain was to go to Wall Street, New York, and give the sharks a piece of his mind. The Bishop of London's wages are ten thousand a year, and the income tax on this is three thousand, and rates taxes and other charges total another two thousand. So on £3,500 a year (about as much as Charlie Chaplin gets for turning two flips and throwing tfx tarts). Arthur has to keep Fulham palace going, a motor car, and ten servants. The great English divine has been

told he'll have to give up Fulham Palace (which the Church has held for 1300 years!) and he says he isn't going to do-any* such thing. But what Arthur made his great point . about was that parsons- had been used to living on the dizzy'edge of poverty and bankruptcy and that "the scandal of poverty would never occur again. Dr. Ingram got off-his explanation about his income and his appeal for more gold for the clergy on account of newspaper articles saying he ought to be ashamed of himself for having so much money. : He has lately put London House in the hands of agents because he can't afford to run it.

Glad to see the N.Z.R.S.A. has the necessary "nous" to rake in officers of field rank, thus enabling the show to carry more weight with political 0.8.E.'s and place hunting duds. Wellington branch has appointed Lieut.-Col. George Mitchell, D.5.0., N.Z.M.R., to organise for it in the Wellington district and George will hobble round on his game leg and do it with aplomb. Lieut-Col. Mitchell went to the big war—Gallipoli, Egypt, Palestine, France, etc. —from the territorials (he was a Major in the Otago M.R.) and has been seriously wounded and accidentally damaged. He began real soldiering nearly 20 years ago as a trooper in the Ist N.ZjM.R. (Africa) and afterwards followed the amateur strafe profession until the dinkum go happened.

He is one of those eccentric chaps who lives for the job he is on and does it to the last dot of an "i." The N.Z.R.S.A. is doing itself no harm by getting Lieut-Col. George Mitchell, D.5.0., to put his shoulder to the wheel. Major Mitchell was decorated with the Servian War Cross.

The late Mr Rodolphe Marie Martin Joseph Laurent, whose death at the advanced age of 93 years, occurred at Hawera, came to New Zealand over 67 years ago, making his first home in Wellington, where he married a daughter of Captain Scott,

of Wellington. Prior to coming to the colonies he served in the French army, reaching the rank of major. He had five grandsons on active service. His greatest wish had been to see the war finished, his country free, and his boys returned, and his wish has been gratified. One of his grandsons has won the V.C., and another has been recommended for the D.C.M.; and what he considered the greatest honour of all'was. that they all volunteered. He leaves a wife and grown-up family of six sons and four daughters to mourn their loss. The old gentleman came of a wellknown family of Picardy, with which the Duke of Kent, father of Queen Victoria, is said to have contracted an alliance. The Duke is stated to have legally married Madame de St. Laurent, Baroness de Fortison, a

French-Canadian lady. The validity of the marriage was not recognised, by the laws of England when he married Princess Victoria Mary Louisa of Saxe-Coburg, who became the mother of Queen Victoria. The Duke was said to have left a son by his morganatic wife, and this son was known in later years as BrigadierGeneral Green. Mr. Laurent, of Hawera, came of the family to which Madam de Laurent, Baroness de Fortison, belonged.

About ten thousand novelists have used the device of the sinister influence of precious stones as basis for a book. A real life yarn links fifteen tragedies with the celebrated Hope diamond possessed by Mrs Edward Beale McLean. Murders, thefts, violent deaths, and so on have followed the celebrated stone. Vinson McLean, the ten-year-old son of the above-named lady was heir to twenty million pounds (pause for breath). This little kiddie possessed an army of servants —even his baby pram was armour-plated and his private playground—netted in with steel meshes, but he one day escaped all hands and like any other little child ran out into the street. He was instantly killed by a chance motor car. Hundreds of millions of children brave the perils of great cities every day— unattended, but the best protected youngster in Britain with £20,000,----000 coming to him meets death the first time he is ever alone.

Corporal H. Gordon, an ex-New Zealander serving at present with a Scottish regiment with the British Army on the Rhine, writes:—lf there's going to be a future slather up between Fritz and John Bull the pair of .them are going a queer way about it. There is less trouble to the acre with Germans and British and Americans than at any ordinary time. There are strong indications of a real "entente" between Gretchen and Jock, and Jock seems to recognise in Gretchen those qualities of thrift and hard work noticeable in his own Scottish women. All soldiers here are struck with the innocent, simplicity of the German peasants—and now the manufactured official ferocity is dead, the working Hun seems the most harmless of all God's creatures. You see British soldiers and German women and men helping each other in the fields and going about in an extraordinarily comradely way. It is most inexplicable, but certainly true, that hate has faded from their souls.

One supposes that the long list of New Zealand troopship papers is coming to an end and "Napoo" ("Tommy for 'II n'ya plus ") the Rimutaka homecoming paper is perhaps (in a literary sense) one Of the best of the bunoh. Corporal Dick Harris, a journalist of marked literary ability edited this little paper and it is full of nice thoughts and excellent verse. The hand of "Corporal Dinkum" is everywhere seen and especially is the most characteristic in "Ballade of Times Past." Here is the opening verse: — Isabelle, Minchen, Louise, Ricquette, Reiby, Ethel, Manon, Margot, How shall I think of you sans regret, Now you are one with the long ago? It's hey! for to-morrow and all its gold— For love and laughter are still to find— . But yesterday is a tale that is told; And it's oh! for the girls we have left behind!

"Dinkum's" heart is with Isabelle, who dreams in Devon, Minchen, who smiles upon the lordly Rhine, the vivacious Marie who coquettes at Merieux and with tender little Louise of Fontaine. There have been passages with wee Manon at Famichon and tender words with Ricquette at Rouen. The waist of "placid Margot of Doullens is pressed by other sleeves and Reiby of Bath paces forth up Lansdown Hill with another and Ethel married a Bournemouth butcher. What i.s one to do? Marry a New Zealand girl after all ?

Passed away peacefully at his late residence, Church Street, Te Papapa, Onehunga, that highly respected and honourable old pioneer, Mr. William Tapp, who had attained the ripe age of 73 years. Of that period he spent 69 years in the town of Onehunga, residing on the same property and carrying on the occupation of a farmer. He was a quiet, hard-working, and methodical man, and almost up to the time of his decease carried out extensive cropping.

Mr. Tapp was born in Hampshire, England, and arrived in New Zealand by the ship "Oriental Queen" in the year 1850. He took an active interest in the welfare of the town of his adoption, and for 18 years served as a member of the Onehunga Borough Council; was a good churchman, and an adherent of St. Peter's Anglican Church, serving for some years as a vestryman. He also took an active interest in Friendly Society work, and was senior trustee of Court Pride of Onehunga, Ancient Order of Foresters, almost from the date of its fiSt'option.

On the 3rd July, 1915, Mr. Tapp celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of his wedding, and was on that occasion congratulated by his best man (Mr. C. Horscroft) and , his bridesmaids, his two sisters (Mrs. Walker, since deceased, and Mrs. C. V. Hill).

Mr. Tapp leaves a widow and a grown-up family of five isons and three daughters: Mr. Wm. Tapp, Palmerston North; Mr. John Tapp, Te Kuiti; Mr. Frank Tapp, Cambridge; Messrs. Fred and E. McC. Tapp, Te Papapa; Mrs S. Hill, Otahuhu ; and the Misses E. and F. Tapp; and 17 grandchildren, and his sister, Mrs. C. V. Hill, to mourn their loss.

His familiar figure, regularly at work in his fields, and every Sunday morning to be seen wending his way to morning service (it is said to his credit that he never missed church on the Sabbath unless indisposed), will be missed by

many Onehungaites who had. grown to look upon him almost as a landmark, and who held him in the highest honour and respect. The funeral took place on Tuesday afternoon, at Waikaraka Cemetery, and was largely attended.

Two thousand Pressmen in New Zealand will be pleased to hear ol the Knighthood conferred upon Mr. George Fen wick, the managing director of the Otago "Daily Times and Witness." Mr. Fenwick next to Mr. Henry Brett, has been longer at the Press game here in this country than any other savant, and long before the present United Press Association was inaugurated in 1879 he had a great deal to do with Mr. Brett in founding New Zealand's original Association, which catered at that time for the morning publications alone. This first conglomeration of New Zealand newspaper interests occurred a few years after the days when Mr. H. Brett was an energetic shipping reporter in Auckland, and it marked the first era in the evolution of tho modern newspaper in this country. Since then Mr. Fenwick has remained in the first rank of New Zealand newspapermen, and has made quite a big splash in the commercial world besides. He was Chairman of the recent New Zealand Press delegation to the Old World.

The lure of the waterfront has dragged down to the city side of the Waitemata many a man with a special gift for other things than just humping cargo from ship and shed. The organising ability of some of the Auckland wharf toilers was well demonstrated by the results of the "Smoko" they designed to assist their, projected band the other evening. It was really a great affair, with a couple of dozen of the city's men of weight assembled to say the necessary fair words and sweet promises, a good crowd of cosmopolities to assist in tho operations of drinking the giggle-juice and puffing the cigars and burning the cigarettes, and a coterie of entertainers who made the merry gathering yet more pleasant.

Mr. A. E. Glover made characteristically sentimental remarks aboxit the years that have passed away, the sins of the Government, the heroic efforts of himself to preserve the people's weal, and kindred expressions. He was committed to the toast of "Parliament," and Mr. C. J. Parr had first reply. The exMayor went on a different tack, assuring everybody that he was with them, and promising finances for the band. Then came Mr. C. H. Poole's turn. He tried a third line of attack, compressing his remarks into the rather neatly-expressed notion that he was always the sailor's friend, and would £tay his friend till death did them part.

Mi. A. J. Irvine, of the Union Company, has an awful habit of speaking so quietly that only his next door neighbour has any possible chance of hearing. Well, he said something about harmony, whether ho meant the band or the function is not quite clear.

But Mr. C. V. Houghton, NewZealand Shipping Co., backed his managerial colleague, said he agreed with him and all that, and reckoned he was the oldest watersider in the room. At this Mr. Harry Hillier, the waterside secretary, leant over to the Press table and whispered confidentially that Mr. Houghton had been working on the wharf over thirty years ago. Mr. Houghton said nice friendly things to the merry watersiders, who had accumulated themselves in the body of the hall, and concluded by offering twenty guineas towards the band. Mr. Irvine did tho same, and Mr. C. Ranson, for the Northern Shipping, did something very similar.

The Deputy-Mayor did not say a great deal, except that the City Council did not have enough money to do as it would like. He was given moral support by such gentlemen as Mr. Patrick J. Nerheny, Horatio Nelson Bagnall, J. Trevethick, Lawyer Hall Skelton and Mr. G. Knight. Other Councillors were there, too, but they were more or less Labour reps. Mr. J. Savage came in late, and sat very silently through the piece, right behind his friend, Mr. G. T. Jones, who • had the honour of offering incense at the shrine of "The Transport Workers." Mr. Jones told everybody what everybody knew already, that the bosses had taught the transporters tho value of •unity, and the transporters would never forget the lesson. * * * Of course, the soldiers could not be forgotten, and Mr. E. F. Andrews was called upon to say something for them. His short address was one long protest against various scandalous things, and his assistant, Mr. L. J. 'Garmson, responded in the same key. But apart from these necessities in the way of criticism for wrongs already accomplished, this representative "Smoko" was as happy an evening as one could wish to find. The pschology of it was that -Mr. Bullion and Mr. Brawn met in fraternity.

So Major-General Sir E. W. C. Chaytor, the New Zealand soldier who" has made a name for himself as a fighting leader in Egypt and Palestine, ;is to get the command of the Homo Army in New Zealand, and Sir Alfred will no longer reign at headquarters. This also puts Brigadier-General Richardson out of the running, but if New Zealand has to find a swell job for all her Generals she will have to annex Australia. The suitability of General Chaytor for the job is not likely to be questioned except by gentlemen who are not going to be commandant. He has highly distinguished himself in two wars, is a cool, calm chap with tactics and strategy all over him, has passed Staff College, and all that, and is a born New Zealander. . Hfis brother, D'Arcy (a Colonel man) is still being administrative in his own particular way in Egypt, and is supposed to be coming home to go squatting some more in Marlborough, where the Chaytor family have many broad acres.

There is a heap of significance in the fact that working men chased and stoned our old friend Labour bleeder, Tom Mann, in Wales. Tom was ordering Britain to "leave Russia alone," and the Taffies took to him and drove him forth. It is a good hint to all wild-eyed humbugs to bob down before the people they lead and bleed, take a hand with them. Even the imported fanatics in New Zealand are reported to be feeling more civilised, and to wonder what's going to happen to them when Labour finds them out. Tom Mann, the ex-publican, who was charged with watering beer, ultimately tried every British country, and endeavoured always to foment trouble. Australia would-

n't have him, he got the boot in New Zealand, and South Africa shooed him off the •premises. Now that Labour won't be bled by him, and wants to bleed him with rocks, perhaps his fanatic friends with their claws clutching the pockets of Labour in this and other countries, will roost high.

Private J. A. Heade, of Auckland, writing from Aldershot, says he hears that New Zealand has abolished its military police, and that "it's just as well." A military policeman checked a private of the Black Watch in an A'ldershot street, and Jock of the "Fortytwas" waved his sporan and sorted out the redcaps. The Jocks invaded all licensed houses (knowing the habits of redcaps), and they were all closed. They carried the doors of the Hippodrome looking for redcaps, and later invaded a picture palace per ladder on the same quest. The redcaps,. who were not in hotels or pic tune palaces, were interviewed in the street, and Jock and Co. dispersed a large picquet sent forth to quell the ,riot. Private Heade says that the disorder was of too large a nature for the authorities to rake all the "Fortytwas" in, but thwt one sergeant is "in" for seven years, and a private will do "three stretch." ■ <ss ® ®

Mr. R. A. Kenner, ex "Star" reporter, was "turned down" when he tried to enlist as a soldier. He has however, done three years' pretty good soldiering in France, as one of the V.M.C.A. organisers and workers in the front line, and among other souvenirs of Fritz has a wound to show. Mr. Kenner, who it was believed would go back to journalism has become fascinated with the V.M.C.A. work and leaves Auckland almost at once to take charge of the Christchurch branch. Christchurch V.M.C.A. building, unlike that in Auckland, is wholly in the hands of the V.M.C.A., and is not used as a Soldiers' Club—although, of course, soldiers are as welcome as any other young men. ti§> © ® That bright old soldier, Colonel Stuart Newall, C.8., has passed away at Waihi, and thousands of people who knew and esteemed him will be genuinely sorry. Colonel Newall was a typical Scot, of an essentially military type, and until quite recently was alert and commanding in appearance. He began New Zealand life in the armed constabulary and militia, and not only fought for this country, but worked for it in a very thorough manner, and in the early days military roads, which were a feature of our development, owed much to his skill. Ho commanded a regiment of N.Z.M.R. in the South African War with distinction, and was made C.8., and on his return was given many successive administrative positions. He left the service to take charge of the Wellington Commercial Travellers' Club. During the Great War, and until recently, he was military commandant of the King George Hospital at Rotorua, and when he retired all hands showed great esteem for him. He was in all his colonial career remarkable for his physical and mental activity.