WITH BROOMS FOR OARS.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 975, 16 November 1910, Page 6

WITH BROOMS FOR OARS.

A WHARFSIDE SCENE. "See that?"It was the remark of an R.N.R. on the wharf about midday yesterday, and it was delivered with an emphasis which implied that there was really something to see. What was it ?, There was nothing but howling wind, and the scurrying "white horses!' on tho bay, and the steady rain that almost blotted out the ships in a thick veil of grey. "Those Chinamen, I mean I" went on the R.N.R. man, anxious . that someone should look at what he evidently considered a "sight." And, sure enough, heading out from the steps at the wharf towards tho steamer Vermont, in the scrappiest of punts, were 'two Chinese sailors, with brooms for oars, thrashing through it laboriously, but stolidly. The wind caught great sheets of water, flung them over these two Eastern mariners, half-flooding the punt, half raising her on tho stern sometimes, and sometimes half on her stems. It did not matter. Tho brooms of the Orientals just plied-on, and the punt got forward through the jobble ■an inch or two at a time. And it was" no jobble. As tho steamer Putiki found later when she went across the bay to work Petone Wharf, and,was banged about so' violently that sho had to come back to town without effecting anything. Presently tho stolid paddiers hooked on at the bow of the Vermont, and began "scrubbing sides," just as calmly as if tho steamer had been a Canton flower boat in a .mill-pond. Tho storm banged and bumped, their cockle-shell against the plates and. up and down, but the two calm pagans just scrubbed on. ' "My word,".said tho R.N.R. man, "I've seen a lot of things at sea, but I've never seen a European crew tackle a job over the ship's side on a day like this I- Washing paint workYes,,. I've seon 'em do that, but, over the "side! —its' mildly funny. Brooms for oars, too!" ,