WITH THE ALL BLACKS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 72, Issue 174, 24 July 1929, Page 4

WITH THE ALL BLACKS

EMMA SEES A MATCH. ECHOES OF SOUTH AFRICA. “With the All Blacks losing the Second Test and the rubber on their Australian tour,” writes a correspondent of the “Chronicle,” “perhaps your Rugby enthusiasts may be cheered up by the following, which was reprinted from the Daily Despatch, East London:— Says my old man, “Emma, what about the All Blacks?” “Not for me, thank you,” says I; “too many of ’em croscs my path eveiy day of me life.” “Stoopid,” says he, being of the plain-spoken sort; ‘these ’ere is white blacks—footballers from New Zealand, visiting in South Africa.” “Pleased to mee ’em then, I’m sure,” says I, being by nature friendly like. And that’s how it came about as I found mesclf going to the Rec. along with a tram full of people, and glad was I as I’d put on me new shoes in spite o’ mo corn, for everybody was that smart as it looked like Jo’burg, a place I hope to see some day. I’d had a deal of trouble about gettin’ rightly dressed. I to me neighbour. “What’s the correc’ attire for a football match?” “Jersey and shorts,” say she, sharp like. “Look ’ere,” says I, “don’t you getfunny with me”; and then she laughs, and my old man joins in till he sees me fixin’ him with me eye over the top of me glasses. Gettin’ out of the tram a man says, 11 Bound to b.e a wash-out”; and when I gets to the Rec. I sees his meanin’, for there was the firemen and the red ladders, an’ everything ready for turnin’ on the hose when thjj game gets too hot. Then I catches sight of the ambulance and the police, an’ I gives a hop of sheer joy thinkin’ of the fun to come, but me old man says, ‘ ‘Shook hurtin’ already, missus?” • • ■ •

When I sees where I’d to sit on the stand I was for turnin’ back, but “Top row, if you can get there, and mind the step, ma,” says young impudence as as took the tickets, and that settled it, and up I goes, glad every time I treads on anybody, as it was me new shoes.

When I gets me breath, I looks round and sees a rare crowd, a’ this bein’ the first football match, I gets a real thrill at seein’ people in a fresh place, so to speak. There was the parson come out of his pulpit, an’ there was the man as I pays me rates to, come out of his glass box an’ both siftin’ side by side on the grass gatin’ ice cream. “So even they’s human,” says I to me old man.

All at once the people starts cheering, and there right across the nice grass streams a lot of men. Says Ito meself, “Knowin’ the weather’s uncertain they’ve put on their old clothes, an’ quite right too.” Them All Blacks seem a bit lost like—so far from home and mother, thinks I—and they goes and linjes up and chants a dirge and stretches out their arms to their strange gods. “Heathen, askin’ help from fyeign deities,” says I, having learnt a Hot at missionary meetings, but my old man says, “Shut up, Emma, it’s their War Cry”; an’ that was the first I’d heard of their bein’ Salvationists.

Then they gets busy, an’ before I’d time to ask why the ball wasn’t round, half them fellows was rolling on the ground. Then before I’d time to ask what they did it for, they was playin’ ring, all pressed close together sometimes with their heads on the ground an’ sometimes with their feet. “My!” says I, “them chaps ’ll need to be strong at both ends.” As I says, this bein’ me first game, p’raps I’m not the best judge, but it seemed to me they’d have got on better without the old gentleman as hopped round with ’em all the time. Nice gent, too, an’ the most decent dressed of the lot, all. in white, and active as you make ’em; but interfering! Oh, my, never let ’em be for a moment! Just when a chap was having a fair run for his money, up he comes, blows his whistle, an’ they has to start all over again. Then when they’s as happy as kids twisting round with their ring o’ roses, there’s the white gent again, peeping about for all the world as if he wanted to see if their bootlaces was coming undone. A nicer lot of people I never see than ; the spectators, all so willin’ to help, some of ’em even standing up an’ shouting direction, an’ givin’ ’em hints. When the ball come bouncing over the line tjiere was a chap ran forward and showed the gentleman what carried the Army flag, just where it touched the chalk—laid his hankie down an’ all. So thoughtful of him, thinks I; no wonder the crowd laughs an’ gives him a cheer.

And I see another man when the ball come all among the people, stand right up and kick it back—not throw it, like others. My! he got that chesty over it, as I knew in a year or two he’ll tell his children he playgd football with them All Blacks.

“Has they got shirts under their jerseys, or hasn’t they?” was what a lot of schoolgirls round me was asking each other out loud; but I keeps me own counsel and turns a dull ear; them sort of questions not bein’ discussed in public when I was a girl—but I seen my old man joining in quite sprightly like. My, but I do think them chaps wants learnin’ manners—the way they hacked at that nice grass was something hawful, specially them All Blacks. “Dig-

gin’ for worms?” asks someone; an’ another fellow shouts “Try seccotine!” but they didn’t seem able to take no hints, an’ goes on deaf-like. I didn’t just see the finish, me bein’ busy huntin’ for me shoe, which I’d taken off to ease me corn; but I’ve askfcd mo old man who won, an’ ho says them All Blacks did. I can’t help wishing now that our Border men had chanted and cried them strange cries at the beginning. It might have helped, but then again it mightn’t—you never know!