THE WEEK.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 9115, 21 December 1907, Page 4

THE WEEK.

Many a man's empty pockets are due to his wife's fondness for change.

A New York banker is reported to have fallen from a window the other day and x been killed. He lost his balance. v

#" • Campaigning on the roof is the latest London craze. After all this is probably better than having the key of the street.

If a football referee wants to be popular he should never be impartial. If he is, he will be cursed by/both sides instead of by on©.'

Freddy will be a noted politician come day. During the school examinations this week he was asked, " How is the earth divided?" This was an easy one, of course, and the answer came pat and prompt: "Between them that's got it and them that wants it."

Arthur Bourohier's new play must be an intensely human one. At least, so "The Week" would judge from this appealing line from the Press paragraphs : —

Act 11.— " Next Morning." Bo many people hare been that way before.

One does not generally look for humour in the average But one of them, scored .in Leeds lately when h© chese' a perfect ruin^of an old house ac the site for placarding Mr George Alexander's tour with "His House in Order." It's up to George Hobbs now to bill the gaol with " Home. Street Home" posters.

A Lancashire paper, commenting upon the » municipal ' elections, states that "the fate of the town, so far as its municipal affairs go, will have been settled for a few years, if not for several." There is nothing like being precise about a little matter of that sort.

The man who had dined badly was asked the next day how he had fared. But he was a cheeryNoptimist, and his answeV was right there. "Excellently, excellently," he chirped. "The dinner was charming. It gave me such an appetite that I had to stop and have a^sandwich on my way/ home to lunch."

Kinross, a local cultivator of the cow in Taranaki, has discovered that matrimony has its compensations after all. Speaking to> a, friend on a. trip to the Old Country, as one incident in the drab story of his life he related : "Edie made the third daughter we had, bora in the South Island^ and it came in handy afterwards to have bred our own vdairymaids."

George Samuel Munro has departed for ever, shaking the dust of Christchurch from his feet without even his celebrated counter-lunch having eventuated. He hurled one final insult at the city, and with that splendid magnanimity of the martyred hero he then, issued a general invitation to "even the poorest citizen " to visit him upon

the West Coast. So far none have been found so poor as to do M™, reverence.

Many and varied are the uses of a j lamp-post. On© of these. is< to oanryi a lamp. But round that dark cemetery j corner near the river the City Council has had / a lamp-post erected for months, which so far has failed to shine upon a naughty world. Its primary purpose was to light young lovers to some more 6ecluded v 6pot, but its present mission is tot act as a tryebing place for love's young dre-am.

When Marcus saw Jim Maomahon's reference to him as " a garrulous little beggar," he enjoyed the joke immense-

ly. "My word, 1 ' he commented, "that's one up against him." When Jim Macm.a'hott saw his reference to

Marcus in print, he enjoyed tfhe joke immensely. "My word," he commented,, "that's on© up against him." It is seldom two birds can kill each other with" the same stone.

Reporting the details of a bequest for tea-parties to . old people the ""Tribune" states that "old parsons are not to. be barred on any religious or political grounds, nor unless suffering from dangerous or infectious diseases." This looked at first sight like one of those bigoted attacks upon a long-buffering Church, until it dawned upon "The Week" that the playful compositor had probably been taking too little water in it again.

A gentleman from South. Africa was recently visiting a boys' club in Lime^ house, and the youngsters were much interested in hearing that his relatives had been fighting on the British side during the South . African war. Still his own absence required explanation. "You see," he urged, "a lot of my relations were fighting on the other side, too." The answer was accepted with some suspicion, and the cross-ex-amination was pushed further by a small boy, who demanded: "Why didn't you go as referee?" Now the Government missed that happy inspiration. This comes of having no Portfolio of Football.

The musical critics of the local newspapers are always in trouble among those whom they are called upon to criticise. This is gradually wearing them both to shadows, but they may take, heart of grace and divert the wrath of the community to the casual critics of the pit. Coming out of the Musical Union concert last Wednesday, two of these were heard discussing the performance of the orchestra somewhat disparagingly. One of the two finally summed up the situation emphatically thus : " After all, what can you expect when half of them are derelicts and the other half kids?" This is grossly untrue, of course, but then so are the stories of " A.L.0.E.," which, according to the title-pages, are "founded on fact."

Here's a belated story about the Gaming Bill. When the Bill .was before the select Parliamentary committee Sir George Clifford was giving evidence, and incidentally, while protesting against the exclusion of the double totalisatoT, stated that the bookmakers were in the habit of laying doubles on " this and the next." " This and the next? What is that. Sir George?" demanded Sir Joseph Ward, whose* ignorance on racing matters is^ of course, proverbial. H The chairman of the conference at once explained what the phrase meant to the Premier's satisfaction. The next witness on the list was Mat Barnett, and as he entered the committee-room Sir Joseph looked quietly from i>he baronet to the bookmaker and remarked slyly, "Ah, I see. This and the next."-