THE WEEK.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 7293, 4 January 1902, Page 4

THE WEEK.

• Readers of Victor Hugo's " Toilers by the Sea" will sympathise with a bather off Timaru breakwater who, this week, when stripped for his plunge, noticed a fair-sized octopus just below him. He shifted his quarters (the man, not the fish) with celerity, and moved on a bit ere diving. Adopted, in fact, a policy of s(cuttle). « We always considered " Timi " Carroll a real lover of his race. And yet, at the Rapaki gathering this week he advised them (by proxy) to study an Act of Parliament ! Talk about pestilence, battle, murder and sudden death ! The Maoris may survive big guns, beer and Bibles — but 'they had better draw the line at attempting to assimilate the creations of the Statute Book. .-♦- Fancy Australia dividing her splendid army of one thousand into "units" and " half units " to appease the military ardour of the various States ! Why,, there won't be enough to go round. It's about as shabby as if Carnegie endowed a public institution with a "tenner." ■■ ' ■ ■♦ ■ It is a great .pity and a big mistake to leave out, year after year, the Coasters' Race at the Lyttelton Regatta. Plenty of entries could be got if desired. As a public attraction it far exceeds half the events on which the prizes are at present distributed. If the regatta is to maintain its position as a popular attraction, some determined effort must be made to introduce novelties and keen contests. ' ♦_ : Remark of an official, more critical than cultured, on inspecting the riding drill in the Park. "There they go, with their 'ands hup and their 'eels hup, and their J 'cads and 'carts down ! When they ought to 'aye their 'cads and 'carts hup, and their 'ands and 'eels down." y

The only artificial provisions for saltwater bathing at Timaru are- a few old match-boxes called, by courtesy, bathingmachines, which, probably, came out of the Ark, and only 'venture to the edge of the briuy. Otherwise you can go off the wharves or breakwater early in the morning. No extra charge for dressing the wind. On the other hand, gorgeous fresh-water baths are being put up. No wonder old Davy Jones feels a, bit savage now and then, and chucks a few thirty-ton concrete blocks around." 4 •

Had De Wet's latest exploit — that of rushing Williams's camp at Tweefontein— I been done by Britons — especially when fighting for their country against lpng^pdds, writer and poet and pa-inter would have handed it down as a sort of mixture of Thennopylse and Balaclava, with the added glare of success. As it is, however, "the least said the soonest mended." So we patronisingly refer to De Wet and Co as " active guerillas," Verily, the same action alter through different spectacles J ; *-^