After Dinner Gossip and Echoes of the Week

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 2, 12 January 1907, Page 35

After Dinner Gossip and Echoes of the Week

Queer Advertisement®. Apropos of advertisements, of which we were .speaking in our first “par,” is not your curiosity occasionally piqued by the mystery underlying some of those Which appear under the heading of ’•Personals.” There was one this week in a morning contemporary: “Will the pipe-jointer who said he resided at address). Now this enquiry has appeared four or five times, and may be appearing still. It is, it seems to me, full of mystery and suggestion. A pipejointer is a member of a profession hitherto unknown to me even by name, and even now I cannot guess at its secrets. It sounds like a form of plumbing, but are not all plumbers wealthy and well known, whereas, this gentleman has, it yould seem, disappeared like the man in the "Hunting of the Snark,” leaving nothing but a casually given (and apparently incorrect) address behind him. Is love'the object of these urgently repeated enquiries? Did the “pipe- jo'.nter” whisper soft nothings into some Angelina’s ear and offer her a home in the aforesaid Shaddock-street, where he “said” he lived, and then faithlessly desert? Yet, then, she would have known his name, unless indeed it was one of those cases of love at first sight not altogether uncommon to picnics and moonlight excursions these summer nights. Or, perhaps—but no, let the speculative reader construct his own romance out of the doings of the mysterious pipe-jointer, though I confess, like Miss Hartle, 1 “should like to know you know.” © © © Does the Colonial Lad Drink ? The question whether the average colonial youth of to day drinks more than he should o’ Saturday nights and during holiday times, has naturally cropped up again during the last few days, and the writer has heard a good deal of

nonsense and exaggeration introduced into a subject which always arouses

keen and often bitter controversy. Of one thing those suspiciously on the look out for youthful drunks may, if they do not wilfully blind themselves, make their minds certain, that for every genuinely intoxicated lad abroad on such nights • s New Year’s Eve, there are scores and ■cores of silly fellows who are shamming. The sham drunks, the young fellows who think it "fun” to more or less roll In' their gait as they parade in long Tows arm in arm up and down the principal thoroughfares, are to be found in nil' cities, but they are far more common in colonial towns than at Home. The colonial youth is naturally sober, he d<fts not crave stimulants, he has not been surrounded by drink and temptations to drink to excess as are so many of his class at home. But he likes to “di> the pubs” as he would say, and thinks it “the thing” to pretend to be “i- bit tiddley.” It is incredibly silly and vulgar of course, and so, as soon as ■lie gains a certain number of years, or gets “engaged” or married, he leaves this folly to the next generation of fools. It you doubt all this, make special observations next time you are abroad on a Saturday evening. There lire very many “boys” rowdy, but you will see barely any men of, say. from 25 to 35 drunk—or if you do they are, thank God, few and far between. This means that the young married men in the colonies do not drink, and therefore the colonial is temperate by instinct. He may fool with shandies and sham drunk in his calf days, but he is a sensible ■olier follow when he settles down to Biarrjgd lite and its respoustbilities.

The Absurd Exam, for Fishermen.

There are no doubt some reasons to

be advanced for insisting on an examination for fishermen, but until one hears them the majority of us will probably consider the new regulation absurd. A license is advisable for obvious reasons, but by the new regulation, which came into force on New Year's Day, those who go down to the sea in smacks after the succulent schnapper must face (and pass) an examination which to many of the class from which fishermen are drawn, must prove arduous, vexatious. and perhaps prohibitive. It is required now that the intending fisherman must be able to read, write, nave a knowledge of the first five rules of arithmetic, and the number of questions on technical, points he will he called upon to answer is rather appaling. The applicant must understand the rules of the road as regards steamers and sailing vessels, the regulation lights and fog and sound signals, the international code signals, the harbour regulations, the colonial bar ami tidal signals. and be able to answer “any other questions appertaining to this class of vessel and the duties of the master of such vessels as the examiner may put to him.” No doubt the weeding out of the unfit will be further accelerated,

but yet it is hard that one more profession should be b.arrassed by the exam, which, simple to the majority, is pro hibitive to the few. Fishing, one had thought, should lie free as the fish themselves, to anyone with the grit—and it needs grit—to face the life, with its very real hardships, and learn the moods aviheds of fish. © © © Another Golden Year of Plenty. If the advertisement sheets of the daily press of the colony are any criterion —and surely there is no more sensitive and reliable barometer —the eolonv is going to have another year of almost unexampled prosperity, lake up what paper you will in any city, from Dunedin to'Auckland, and you will see a series of “\Yanteds” in the direction of employees required, ’ which is - simply amazing. I’iek and-sliovel men are advertised for the score, and are required, too, in two or three different directions; while in every Walk of life, from this up, to managers and secretaries, good men are urgently asked for their services. No doubt the “ waster ” still finds a pinch to get permanent work, but, despite the hundreds of immigrants pouring into the colony from England and elsewhere, there is still an unsatisfied demand for workers. One firm alone. I notice, asks for between three and four hundred gumdigger-, and states that from £4 to £5 per week can be made. This is probably somewhat of an optimistic estimate, and the work is lonely and arduous, and. moreover, gum country is unbeautiful, though the latter detail might count for little. Hut. even then, with a big margin off, the pay is remarkable for unskilled labour.

Again, ti big steam laundry in one of our provincial capitals, announces it requires young people of both sexes, while factories of all sorts appear to want hands. This is all exceedingly hopeful and cheery, and will, one hopes, effectively stop the. mouths and pens of those selfish and short-sighted persons' wiio endeavour to diseourage immigration, and delight to pretend that all trades and professions out here are overcrowded. ".'stuff and nonsense.” my pusil lanimous growlers! It is only because you fear a better sir more iiqrd-working fellow will raise the standard, and cause you to put mole “baek” rnlo. job

that you growl. That is altog ther likely. and may be unpleasant for you. if you’re inclined to loaf, but it’s no bad thing for the country. © © © Prosperity and Nerxous Prostration. When a man is making money fast he spends easily and is happy. When a nation is making “ big money,” it, too. feels happy and business hums. The colony of New Zealand is just now happy man. How long will this last? There usually comes a time when gold returns are not so good; when wool is down, and llax and kauri gum “wobbly”; and we don’t feel so rich, and don’t spend our money. Then we have Bad Times, and the wiseacres tell us why—the Government, the Labour laws, overspeculation, or whatnot. But there is something more in had times than poor seasons or a slackening demand for “goods,” or what the wiseacres say: there is the fact of general depression. When a man has a bail fit. of the blues with doubt, discouragement and suspicion, the doctor diagnoses his ease for inactive liver, or used-up nerves, and gives him a pill. What is really the matter with him is a nervous reaction from a period

of over - stimulation, either work or dissipation. In the same way the country has its fits of melancholia, and it takes time and money to get cured. Our next fit will come when we have filled ourselves up with Prosperity and got a national indigestion. The prudent man, having once experienced this disagreeable sensation of reaction, takes pains to avoid excess in the future. He pays some heed to his stomach and nerves, and strives to keep a healthy mind in a sound body. As a people we do not seem capable of restraint, of temperance. We like to “ go it ” —and then pay the bill. But a case of national nervous prostration is both expensive and needless. Let us begin to take the rest cure early, and avoids depths such as we had in 1885 and 18SG © © © An Absolutely Unique Honour. Since the day when queens were buried in the abbey no woman lias received the honour of interment in the British Valhalla. It was, however, quite fitting that this honour should have been shown to the late Baroness Burdett -Coutts. Few women have ever done so much for the cause of philanthropy, and she has an especial claim on the gratitude of our colonies, as, besides her liberal endowment of three colonial bishoprics, she gave large sums to help to assist poor families to emigrate, and was a warm friend of the Australian aboriginals. Her husband sat as Conservative member for Westminster, a seat her father. Sir Francis Burdett, had held at the beginning of the last century. Sir Francis was always the idol of the people, and once when he was being conveyed to the Tower for breach of privilege, the mob attacked the police escort, and it was only the fire of the troops that eventually drove them off. After one election he obtained an un-

comfortable anti dangerous cniniM**. the people drawing him in a car from Covent Garden to Piccadilly. he being seated at the top of a lofty Corinthian pillar. The Baroness was suppo-o-l to haw suggested the character of Mbs Messenger in “All Sorts and Conditions of Men.If We Got Tahiti. I see there is some talk of Tahiti lasing ceded to Britain. It would certain* ly make a capital naval station for ths Pacific. The French have always had an idea that the English intended to seize it. 1 can remember the scare they got at the time of the Fashoda incident. They made arrangements to b’oek the entrance to the harbour and removed the guns from their man-of-war to their hill forts. Every Englishman was regarded as a possible spy. and placed untier the surveillance of a gendarme. The natives spread a report one night that an English gunboat had been scon outside the harbour, and there was a general stampede of the coloured | opulation from Papeete into the interior. Tahiti is a land of many coins, though not of recent coinage. The chief coin is the ( hili dollar, worth about Is. 9d. This is the size of an English live-shil-ling piece, and large sums of money take some carrying. I have seen a sailor taking his dollars round the sah:o?t> in a bucket. There is the American dollar also, ami the French franc and tht? English shilling all in circulation. A senior wrangler might easily fail ti> grasp the intricacies of exchange. Dealing With the Drunks in Tahiti. The French on the island have a delightful way of dealing with tin* ordinary drunk and disorderlies. They take the offender and put him in the calaboose till he is sober. There is mi trial or tine or police court. 'The officials are politeness itself. 1 rcinomb *i an indignant Englishman protesting loudly against this summary treatment. While the gendarme was asking him ‘'Where born you was?” and nth *r futile questions, the free-born Briton was declaiming about Magna ( harta and Habeas Corpus. “You cannot/’ hr indignantly exclaimed, “imprison a man without making a charge against him. What is the charge?’’ “Ah!’’ replied the polite gendarme, “we make no charge. It is all free.” An Impetuous Borrower. The cables tell u< of an enterprising New Yorker, who entered a bank and demanded a loan of a thou-and pounds. That seems a natural enough action. He did not wish to give any security, probably he thought his promise to pay was enough. But when lie failed to obtain it. ho blew up the unfortunate cashier, not metaphorically, bat I torall v. Truly, the lot of a bank clerk is hard. Had ho granted the loan (he manager would have blown his head off for him. but that would perhaps have been better than being blown («• fragments.

In the course of an interview with a •’British-Australasian" inquisitor. Miss Emil? Soldenc told the tale of how her company came to play in Auckland in the far-oft seventies of last century: •‘We were the fir<t burlesque crowd, of any >ize and standing, to go South. There were 60 of ns. It was called the Foldenc Opera Company, but it was really under the sole management of Chizzola. Wc lauded in Auckland. first, and the initial omen was ominous. The wheel of the cab came off as we drove up from the wharf, and tumbled us in the mud. We had no intention of playing there, but wo met De Lia«, and inaide an hour he bad booked us for a month. A curious thing happened at the first rehearsal. Our band parts were from the Gaiety Theatte, We had used them all through England and America, and nobody had ever had a word to say. And yet, out therf, in that little corner of the world, up s|»oke the double bas-% and said there was a wrong note marked in his part. ~And there \ta j , too. This might prove a powerful anecdote to point the moral of bow much inorc observant the Antipodean musician is than hi. European coutrere.’ —