LONDON LETTER

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 72, Issue 291, 7 December 1929, Page 17 (Supplement)

LONDON LETTER

LONDON, Oct. 10. The Hatry Drama. If the full story of the Hatry affair is ever disclosed, which might not be essential to the most comprehensive legal proceedings, the public will get a ready-made film thriller. According to eurrent City gossip only a few days, and an almost incredible coincidence, made the difference between success, which would have meant somewhere about £3,009.099 prolit. and the present debacle. Even M r Edgar Wallace at his best could hardly furnish a more exciting story of romantic big finance, and sudden collapse of daring and stupendous enterprise. It is the sort of rase that the late Sir Edward Marshall Hall would have handled with forensic zest The City is in no mood at the moment to be tolerant of reckless finaxice, but privately one hears even now some cynical admissions of “hard luck.*’ Undervalued Shares. The Citv is already coming round to the view that many of the shares of • companies unconnected with the Hatry complications were marked down too drastically in the first flush of general panic. I hear that the managing diiector of one well-known shipping company. after a busy week-end on the telephone to business friends, raised a fund of £50.900 and started on Monday last to buy small blocks of shares in about 30 well known and well-man- , aged concerns All these shares had ; been marked down owing to the general nervousness, and. in the opinion of the buyers, were obviously undervalPoints For Mr Montague. Mr Montague, wh o is Labour’s Undersecretary fur Air, is at the moment on an intensive European tour, the purpose of which is to compare foreign organisaion and equipment with our own. His interest is, of course, purely concerned with the civil side ol aviaton. but he will certainly find much to startle him in Germany. A network ot air lines now covers Germany, and by means of an admirable pocket diagram travellers can readily find the quickest routes with suitable connections between all the chief cities and foreign aerodromes. The number of air expresses exceed dailv almost any train ‘ x t,'r,'(..iwm -iistant cities in this countrv Excellent accommodation is provided at ail the German aerodromes for passengers waiting air connections, and thev are duly appraised in three languages phen a 'plane is due ; out Mr Montague may also note that all ■ German 'plane, are steel built and readily convertible to military use. Jig-Saw Club Hr G K. Chesterton's list of imag-in-irv queer clubs never envisaged anvt'hing really more b zarre than one that aetuailv exis.--, an.l ha- flour.shed for 20 vears in London. 1 refer to the elub whose members dedicate themselves to the solving of jig-saw puzzlesIt is run on much the same lines as a circulating library, and now has over 2000 jig-saw sets, the pieces in each ot which range from 30<J to 1700, and the use of which is controlled by subscriptions varying according to the size and 1-ompiexity of the puzzles required J. the subscribers. This remarkable institution can claim royal patronage. It harks bark to the period when the jig-saw was almost as much a craze as the cross-word now is, and when Kin-- Edward's hosts were expected in the ordinary way to supply new ami interesting 'jig-saws for their Royal guest ami his friends. It is said that jig-sau ing is more soothing than pa--1 ience. Click! Ju these pampered days of local anaesthetics ami <-Oraine injections the dentist’s chair has lost its Victorian terrors So possibly sufferer s no longer have the experience of finding their Tooth ceases to ache the moment they see the dentist’s brass plate. But a friend of mine, a well-known London journalist, has just had a more embarrassing experience. He ricked a knee bad I v* and fur months limped around on a rubber-tipped stick. At last his editor insisted on ringing up a Harleystnet specialist, and making an appointment for him, and off hobbled my friend to keep it. He took a ’bus to the West End. but. as he crossed the road to hi-g surgeon’s floor, a taxi suddenly honk-honked right on top of him. His leap for the pavement gave him a =hovt <»f agonv in the bad knee, and something seemed to click. He found he was perfectly cured. and put his stick under his arm to interview the im redulous surgeon. Overcoats and Skates! Those whom we call rustics, and K. termed “landward folk,’’ have firm superstitions. And though a succession of wretched summers preceding 1928. despite abundant berries in our hcd-_es may have exploded one of these for tow nsfoik. country people still cling to others. From two different run:l s?»ur< < s I have received positive assuram-cs that an exceptionally hard winter lies ahead of us. One of these prophets bases himself on the fact that the local squirrels are laying in their winter stores earlier ami more assiduously- than usual. The other is a West t’euntry bee-keeper, whose bees arc this vear building their hives of a double thickness. This is, he avers, an infallible omen of a very hard winter —as infallible as were last spring’s high-nesting crow’s of the glorious summer we are still savouring. Spring in Autumn. The drv summer may have been had for farmers, but it has certainly been good for flowers. Last week-end I l Mind violets blooming in the woods r< u’hl Blackdown. Such a discovery v '.in a few days of October, is out- • my recollection. Hampshire is r> :w I fancy. the least spoiled of all on • s« -i-Thern English counties, and desp:*e the depredations of motoring vandals. the richest in wild flowers. But the Blackdown walk had other thrills. We turned a leafy corner to run right

into the Chiddingfold pack, a forest of white-and-tan tails in a narrow lane, being taken home by two scarlet-coated huntsmen. And we found, miles from anywhere, a charming cottage, with rosegrown verandah complete, whence came grand opera harmony. It was, of course, only a wireless miracle, but we half expected Marguerite to step out of that balcony window. Walking Stick Camouflage. The walking-stick in its time has played many parts. The sword-stick is, of course, almost an antique now. Even more familiifr is the seat-stick, with which sportsmen and golfers sometimes temper the distance to the town legs. In lil’ ol’ New York they carry tangle-foot-sticks, th e ingeniously contrived head s of which conceal tiny spirit flasks. I have heard whisper of sticks that held even more deleterious things than tanglefoot whiskey. Th e American police know all about “dope” sticks. In the Strand y ou can buy a stick that holds a small automatic and a few live “shells,” as the Americans call our cartridges. But this is the first time I have met the walking-stick umbrella. These, are now displayed by West End shopkeepers, and are being patronised extensively. The stick is a smart enough crooked-handle affair, of no unusual girth, but contains, exactly on the sword-stick principle, an effective umbrella. Johnny Hill. The death of Johnny lldl, our British flyweight boxing champion, is sad news. He was only 23, and, though he never looked really robust, was uue our best little fighters since Jimmy Wilde’s palmy days. His father, a stonemason with a boxing flair, taught Jimmy all he knew, and was his man-ager-trainer in all his fights. He brought the bo y along to an amateur championship at the Albert Hall three year s ago, aud Johnny amazed everybody by annexing t A flyweight championship. After turning “pro,” Johnny had a brilliant career, and, though Emile Pladner, the French man, knocked him out in Faris, for the one and only time in his history, many experts considered Hill ’.he better man. He was unwell when he met Pladner, whom he hail twice before outpointed in London. His painfully early demise is probably due to severe training and sweating down to poundage. An attractive boxer of the orthodox upright school, Hill got remarkably- little damaged in most of hi s bouts. New Master of the Household. The announcement that the King has appointed Brigadier General Sir .Smith Hill Child to be Deputy Master of the Household fills an ofiice which has been vacant for som e time. Lord Claud Hamilton held it for a short period, but he relinquished it when he became Equerry to the Prince of Wales and subsequently to the King. Sir Derek Keppo] has been Master of the Household since 1913. He i s 6-1 years of age, and of late has not been in good health. 1 understand that Bir Hill Child will find himself called upo- more frequently to assist Sir Derek than his predecessor was. But despite an active military career, Sir Hill Child has only just entered the 50’s. The duties of the Master of the Household are many and varied. This department, which ! now discharges practically all the duties of the Board of Green Cloth, is responsible for the staff and the arrangements for Stat e functions at the Palace insofar a s the invitations to guests, their reception,' etc., are concerned. Sir Hill Child will take up his duties immediately. One special privilege of the officers of this department is formally to receive the King ami Queen on their arrival to tak e up residence at any of the royal palaces. Banker’s Frank Talk. Outside Bush House, the day the Anglo-Russian agreement was signed, 1 met on e of our great merchant bankers of the city. In pre war days he had immense .Russian interests, and his comments were naturally rather acid, lie observed that the Chancellor of the Exchequer was getting much kudos for saving two or three millions a year out of German reparations at the cost of honest neighbours like France, Belgium, and Italy, but the Labour admirer s of •Soviet Russia ignored the fact that Moscow owed us at least £1,100,000,000 for war loans and private capital sunk in .Russia. Was Mr .Snowden going to make the payment of this —which would settle our American debt and reduce our income tax to Is in the £—a condition of renewed relations with the Bolsheviks? lie stated, further, that the Arcos people, who made plans to move into Bush House a week after the Labour Government came into office, were paying a huge rent and furnishing in princely style. ‘‘Tay Pay’’ Mr T. P. O’Connor, the “Father” of the House of Commons, is 81 ami look.s forward to creating a House of Commons record next year by celebrating his Parliamentary jubilee. L’ntil the return of Air “Joe’* Devlin at the general election, “fay Pay” was the only survivor of the Irish Nationalist Party in the - jusc. lie would tell you with a twinge of sadness, lightened with, a gleam of whimsical humour, that he i s the survivor of many causes —some lost, .some achieved. He has an inexhaustible fund of anecdote s of th ( . frays which enlivened St. Stephen's in the ’eighties, and in which he took a prominent nersonal part. “Tay Pay ’ has a. jiassiono i<*r survival, ami long may he survive. But in th«- Iri.-.h Nationalist Party—as .such- h ( . will leave no disciples. He ha.- survived them all. On his last birth-lav he appealed L the public, for a birthday present of £5,000, not for him?.«li, but. for the Greater London Fund for th f . Blind, in which he has !><•«•« actively interested for the past live years. (“T. P. ” died on November 19; Editor “Chronicle’