THE BOTTLE-0 MAN

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 124, 12 February 1918, Page 8

THE BOTTLE-0 MAN

SHOULD HE BE LICENSED? (By "Sylvius.") "Any bottles to-day, ma'am?" With a start the lady of the house, who has been pegging out a few clothes on the lines, jumps away, and her hand goes to , her heart. When she turns, her frightened eyes alight upon, the thin, bronze figure of a man, with mild, calf-like eyes, and small even features. He has entered so quietly that his soft foot-fall has not even roused the terrier slumbering in the 6UU on the doormat. '

"Any bottles, ma'am?" reiterates the soft,. plaintive voice, with an apprehensive look towards the sleeping canine. ; By this time the woman has recovered her breath and presence of mind. "No, I've no bottles, and don't como here again! Do you understand? Don't come here again 1 . You nearly frightened the life out of mo!" "No bottles?" camo a soft .whisper. "No —no —no —get out!" And with (ire in her eye the irate woman banged the door on the ligure of the slim young Hindu. ■ Every housewife knows the kanaka bottle-gatherer, who has drifted south from India, generally via the sugarcane fields of Fiji, where they work for a contract time under an arrangement between. the Fijian and Indian Governments. They are _ mild, quiet, draaniy-eycd men, who invariably scale not more than eight stone.in weight. ,one quality they have which is of inestimable, value to themselves—persistency. A- kanaka bottle-gatherer may be dismissed half-a-dozen times by the lady of the house, but he always returns, meek, plaintive,, beseeching— almost a pathetic figure. But there is no need for pity. ■ Bottles are'up, and bottle-gathering, is almost confined now to the kanaka, and he does well. In his hours of ease he dresses well in European style, smokes a good cigar, and may bo seen disporting himself in the most expensive, seats in a theatre He is able to do this because several of him : live together • in ' one room —very cheaply —and, as remarked before, bottles are up. ■.

On application to.the Chief City Inspector (Mr. James Doyle), I was surprised to find that bottle-gatherers did not need to be licensed. Their insignia is a Back—preferably r>n old sack—and it gave them the freedom of every backyard in. the city, whether the people" were at home or not. The Maypr (Mr. J. P. Luke) was just as surprised as the writer to learn that the bottle-o man was so generously privileged. He thought that their goings' and their comings should be overlooked by a .responsible officer, and favoured the passing of a liy-lnw whp.reby it would be necessary for any bottle-gatherer; or collector o' old ironj lead, , etc., to register, and take out « licence, to be produced o:> il 1 *" I' would j!so' be w« sort o>' sccrily *.o the puhiV. . ,