WET WICKEDNESS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 11030, 19 March 1914, Page 4

WET WICKEDNESS.

(From tbe Sydney " Sun.") Alderman Ogilvy, acting-Mayor of Manly, was shocked at tbe sight of women passing along the streets in wet kimonos. Council .Inspector Crackenthorp informed him that nothing could bo -June unless the police arrested them for being of unsound mind. The wet and ha.sty mermaids who from out the breakers came, Have shocked tho modest alderman, and brought the blush of shame To mantle on "bis damask cheek and fill 'him lull of woe; It made his heart with horror thrill to see u kimono Wherein a woman from the sea went scooting swiftly by: Her wetness was iniquity to his censorious eye. "Dear mother, may I go and swim?" "Oh, ves, von may, my daughter; But hang vour*clothes on n gooseberry bush; and don't go near the water. ' The heroine of this old rhyme at Manly might essay To please the aldcrmanie eyes that look the other way (f do not think) when dear, damp girls back to their dwellings fly, For, though she wore a. kimono, at least she would be dry. " A!as!' ; said Mr Crack en thorp, "we cannot run them in, Nor measure with a two-foot rule how much they show of shin; Municipal America has left us far behind: The only charge that we can bring is one of unsound niind." If aldermen could find a way they'd frame a by-law yet , t That in tbe streets of Manly Town its wicked to be wet. What does the local copper say? Think von that he will charge These dainty maidens of the Strand as lunatics at large? The village morals are his care; his kind paternal gaze Is ever bent upon the games the joyous village plays; But hero's a proposition which he'll put imon the shelf— , " Phwat. call tbim colleens cranky? Do y' think I'm cracked mesilf?"