AN EMBARRASSED REPORTER.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume VII, Issue 2, 10 January 1891, Page 3

AN EMBARRASSED REPORTER.

One of the most amusing incidents in connection with modern reporting concerns a prelate who is as robust in form as he is indefatigable in work. He went to open a church in a certain village. A reporter was sent to give an account of the opening services ; but the place was somewhat difficult to get at, and he did not reach the edifice until the dignitary had entered the pulpit. The church was crowded. The rustics listened with reverence to the preacher’s words. The silence, except for the prelate’s utterances, was intense. You could, to use an old saying, have heard a pin drop. The reporter was perplexed. His conscience told him he must not wait on ceremony. He must catch the next train back, or his journey would be useless ; and he could not well go without getting some information about the building. So he stood and pondered. Then he took out his book, wrote a note to the churchwarden sitting in the central aisle near the pulpit, and beckoning to one of the village boys crowding about the church door, asked him to take the note ‘ to the gentleman with the bald head,’ pointing to the churchwarden. The note was simply a courteously worded missive asking the churchwarden for a few facts about the dimensions of the church and its cost—such a note as any reporter would have sent in a similar difficulty. The lad took the note and walked up the central aisle" towards the churchwarden. But to his horror, to his dismay, the reporter noticed that the boy wore clogs. Clank —clank clank went the lad up the aisle, making a fearful noise at every footstep. The congregation was aghast, eveiybody’s eyes were on the confused youngster trampling so loudly on sacred ground. Suddenly the prelate stopped his discourse. Sternly he looked at the sacreligious lad, then glanced with scornful pity at the injudicious reporter, and in sonorous tones that penetrated to every part of the church, said : * Boy, boy ! go back, go back ! Ido not blame you so much as the miserable man that sent you !’