THE PASSING SHOW.

Waikato Times, Volume 98, Issue 15341, 15 September 1923, Page 11 (Supplement)

THE PASSING SHOW.

COMMENT AND CRITICISM.

(By "Free Lance.")

Hats oft to the country girls. One of them recently gave passengers by one of the Auckland ferry boats something to think about. She arrived on the wharf as the boat was moving out, but sooner than miss'it she jumped across the intervening chasm, grasped an upright' and swung herself on board in flrst-class acrobatic style. She attributed her ability to carry out such a spectacular stunt to the fact that she was accustomed to springing on to barebacked horses at her father's farm in the backblocks. One doesn't doubt it; for pluck and endurance the average country girl is hard to beat. She will work all day, walk two or three miles perhaps over bad roads to some rural centre, dance most of the night, and come up again smiling at dawn to resume her usual occupations. Also she cau dance just as well as her city sisters, and look as nice into the bargain. * *. * * *

Speaking of country girls, a young woman giving evidence in a Supreme Court case at Masterton the other day rented bow she had charge of all the stud stock (Hereford cattle and Romney Marsh sheep) on a certain property. When stock were drafted there she did the drafting, she classed and selected Romneys to send to the Gisborne fair, and shifted the Hereford cattle about and attended to their branding, and so on. Her proficiency in the work was explained by her having constantly accompanied her uncle about the place, so that during his absence at the war she possessed the knowledge to manage satisfactorily. Good on her pluck! And if by reason of some pretty little accomplishments a city girl is silly enough to look down upon her sister from the country, let her think again. She might feel and would be unutterably helpless herself, if confronted with some of the contingencies a country girl regards as all in the day's march and takes, so to speak, in her stride. *****

To country folk the cream of the joke in, the Masterton case referred to lay in counsel's eloquent peroration. "Is it feasible?" he asked. "Just imagine this young lady riding round the run on her tall horse and feeling the hair on a sheep's back." And the wool on the Hereford cattle, one supposes. It reminds one of the fellow who said he had just put a,bandage on his horse's "back knee." The only hock the poor beggar had heard of came out of a bottle, and to him fetlocks were just a horse's ankles. *****

Is there such a thing as good taste in connection with international affairs, and if so, did the London Morning Post observe its canons when commenting upon the Japanese cataclysm and its probable political effects? Whilst a friendly nation was literally reeling from a tremendous convulsion of Nature it seems coldblooded, to say the least, for the Morning Post to allege Japan's reduction at one stroke to the rank of a second-class Power, and that owing to her losses she will have no anxiety regarding emigration of her surplus population to the United States and elsewhere. It sounds almost like illconcealed rejoicing at Japan's misfortune, and hardly the speech to be expected from any section of a supposedly friendly nation. Not intentionally malicious perhaps, but infernally clumsy. A trodden-on corn isn't any less painful because the offender did not mean to do it. *****

The Taranakl Chamber of Commerce (New Plymouth) has an immigration scheme "on the move, and is now inviting the co-operation of farmers of the province desirous of assisting in the immigration of youths from England. It is proposed to bring out lads from 17 to 20 years of age, fresh from the secondary schools, and selected by the Chamber's representative at Home. The advertisement goes to say that the lads would require to receive training in farm work for a minimum of two years, to be treated as members of the family, to receive nominal remuneration for the first six months, and afterwards such as the improvement in the work warranted, with a minimum of 15s per week. The scheme should be a most excellent one—for the Taranaki farmers. And since boys whose parents could give them a secondary education in England would probably be able to command some capital, they should prove just the sort of immigrants this Dominion needs. »***■;•

But, one thinks,, an English lad with the requisite grit and determination to make good as a farmer in this country will get the worst of such a bargain. ' If he has average intelligence he will be worth far more than his "tucker" in less than six months' time, and after that 15s a week is no wage for what he will have to do on a dairy farm. In the seventies and eighties "cadets" who paid a premium to "learn farming" were the best paying stock on plenty of New Zealand properties. Whether they learnt anything or not depended mostly upon themselves. The "teacher" didn't worry much provided he handled the premium. In any case there were no big dairy herds for the "cadets" to milk and wash-up after weck-in and week-out. But the Taranaki Chamber of Commerce lads will get their whack of such work one may bet. Some of the boys may get a fair enough spin, but all of them in all probability won't. To illustrate what is meant the case of an ex-Indian armycaptain may be cited. On being demobilised he decided to try his fortune in New Zealand, and with the object of gaining experience engaged with a dairy farmer in a locality some distance north of Hamilton. He worked there for months and attained such proficiency that his employer could absent himself from time to time as he pleased. And as remuneration for a long term of solid and faithful toil the ex-captain received his food and a packet of cigarettes at Christmas. As a means of rendering th c situation more comfortable, the employer had a pleasant habit of extolling his own liberality by describing himself to his victim as "not one of those s that want to be paid for teaching a new chum." Now how did he get those cigarettes to give away? Perhaps someone "shouted" and he took them instead of a drink.

! Permanent pensions being paid in England are: Officers, '1022, and men \101.140, ____ -• -r -