POSTSCRIPTS

Evening Post, Volume CXXVIII, Issue 117, 14 November 1939, Page 8

POSTSCRIPTS

€hrohicle and Comment

8Y PERCY fIAGS

That Guy can sure punch a long ball. -::- -::• * Mr. Chamberlain may have "gout, but no twinges of conscience. *■■ . *■. . '■' ■■* Add similes: Ah sad as some of those pohutukawas • down at the Big Show. * -::• ' * Amateur Gardener (Newtown): Come • rain; come wind, come hail —the best thing for any garden is a weekend demijohn.' ■ . • ' «■ • ♦',■■:■■■■♦ The latest small boy story (via L.G.): "What would you do, Daddy, if aa insanitary bomb fell on the house?" "Put oh my .gas mask," replied father promptly. ' 4 * * > ' PERFECTION! Soldiers in the temporary hospital on the Trentham racecourse are reported to have Sister Hennesy and Sister Bass in charge. Really, to complete the story, it only requires Drs. Stout and Usher as camp practitioners^ for the boys to have a .really jolly time. 1 . ~ EX-DIG. H * . * LIMERICK. From -"Ixia" — , There was a braw Scat named Isaiah Who resolved to become a high flaiah; He flew up in a plane, But fell flat again, ' And on faiah Isaiah went haiah. From E.C.— ' There was a braw Scot named. Isaiah, His fortune he wished , to pile haiah; . He put out the sign. Three balls in a line ... Now they say he's about to retaiah. There was a braw Scot named Isaiall Who thought that he'd like to fly haiah. So he put on his kilts, And mounted his stilts . • Isaiah,' the'flaiah, the traiah. - ' . ' . *,' ..•.-•*.-■ >THE "PUNCH".BOWL. (November-December, 1914.) , ; "Klopstock," oaie of bur ; -greatest • . geniuses," says the "Hamburger, Fremdenblatt," "taught us: 'Be not ■ exces- ". sively just.' -We shall endeavour now _;■ to'follow that teaching." We ' should say that, there ,is no great, danger from the German nation breaking" . down under .the strain'of this effort. Mr. Churchill: "Six, -nine, 'twelve months hence you will-begin ,to see results . that will spell the ~ doom of. Germany."—"Daily Mail." " We"'could spell it better than ''• that, in - -threemonths. ' ... "Waal, it's this way. We Amurricans ,«- don't takp no sides —we're ab-sq-lootly . nootral.- We don't give a>row of beans, which- of you knocks the- Germans - cut." ....---. A cynic sends us a tip for the re-, cruiting department of ■ our ' Army. - "Why' go for the single ■ man?", he : asks. "We may expect just as "much. ■ courage from the married man. • He has already proved his pluck." ■• . " . ;" i•- - ■ '#-—■- ; »'."; . -"#-iJ! ;j ,-• ': , KATHARINE MANSFIELD. '" Tom L. Mills has a suggestion tc» make regarding the photograph- of Katharine Mansfield which appeared, in "The Post's" Centennial number. , . "Fm inclined to think 'The. Post's' reproduction is from ,a miniature, painted by a Canadian artist under > a commission from -Kath's sister,., -Mrs. Macintosh' Bell, -when the latter was living in .Canada. Their father; the " late Sir Harold Beauchamp, told me shortly before his death that he,-thought of • presenting the original painting of Kath—he always thought and spoke" of her as Kath or Kathleen,- her baptismal narrfe (she changed it herself rto Katharine) to the Turnbull-Library,-to go.1 with h'is.gift'of the' Katharine Mans- ■ ■ field collection of her 'published works. That.-painting does justice to Kathleen's good looks, as I recall when I said farewell to her just before she left Wellington for London."' Our-contributor also points out that H. B. Marriott-Watson's thrilling story, of adventure in New Zealand,was titled "The Luck of the Spider/ not "The Web of the Spider."' "I still remem- - ber.'' he adds,'"its grip of interest as I read it when it first came out, and that was some yesterdays agone." * ■» «"' ■ THE 1840 COURT! AT THE . EXHIBITION. " A kind of hush is round the place; ; A. silence falls on those who gaze, The sunset light of bygone days Sheds, on, the. scene a - solemn graceg Nay, rather, sunrise light displays The childhood of New Zealand's race,. Oh, the thatched roof, the rugged walls. The plain and homely old-time room! Its glimmering firelight gilds the gloom, . Outside the door, wild .Nature calls,— Calls to the.fight for life or doom,— Offers her peace to him who .falls,— Whose honour rises from. the - tomb. ' Something there is that brings the • tears, — r ' . That lays a silence on our lips, Before those relics borne in ships With those brave, homesick Pioneers. Deep in the sea of memory dips Our thought of all their conquered fears, Their courage never in eclipse. Great story of a hundred ;years! A, - # • • * ■ ASTONISHING PEOPLE. He is one of the wonder men of\ our. time. . Known .in Great Britain and America (he has lectured and shown his photographs to Royalty in England , and at White House in America), , this amazing Yorkshireman was born in 1871. He began life in Fleet Street, but, says G., he turned from the pen to the camera, and after spoiling the first photographs he ever took (with a camera costing less than five shillings) he went on to master the- art, making what are probably the most wonderful and exciting films that "have ever been -produced without faking. Some of the earliest moving pictures of animal- life ever taken were his work, " and his adventures in securing them— often at the risk of his life—make fas- . , cinating reading, notably "In, the Land of the Lion." As far back as 1913, Cherry Kearton and James Barnes were hunting in Africa.' They built hiding places with the sun beating dpwn on them and the temperature at 130 degrees. They learnt, the .drinking habits' of animals, and watched out by a pool they had cr.cssn. They secured" pictures of a dozen giraffes drinking. They found themselves at another, point among a countless number of lions—and this amazing photographer still preserves a picture of one of his leggings bitten through by. the king of beasts. At another point Cherry Kearton photographed one .of the biggest crocodiles ever seen-r-30 feet long: and his luck was -in one thrilling hour when - from a tree he photographed a herd of elephants charging under him-only the unlucky "hunter-was.himself besieged by ants at ,that very moment of triumph But there is no end to the adventures and miracles in the life of Cherry Keartoz? a Yorkshireman who has brought ba<J ' • lung™ 1™ lnci' ed^:.picfu^m • •