THE LOAFER IN THE STREET.

Globe, Volume XXI, Issue 1676, 4 July 1879, Page 3

THE LOAFER IN THE STREET.

The following is one way of putting statistics before a reading public. Is it necessary to say it appears in an American journal:—“ Brave Hearts. Who are not afraid to get married, even though the new Constitution was adopted. During the present week the County Clerk has issued forty-six marriage licenses. The number is fully up to the average for the past month. Then follow the names and ages of the candidates for matrimonial honors.” I don’t know how truthful the “brave hearts” are over in California, but I’m afraid here the “ ages ” would be as unreliable as, let us say, those of a census paper. There’s a good deal in accuracy. I’ve always thought 80. The most accurate man living, probably, is a storekeeper in the northern part of this province. To this merchant the other day entered a customer, wanting five pounds of four-inch French nails. On weighing them out a dilemma ensued. The last nail made the heap over weight when in the scale, and under weight when removed. The accurate merchant offered to square the bargain with his cussomor by throwing in a three and a-half inch nail. Rare business man that, but ho wouldn’t do in the inkslinging lino, where it does not do to cut things to too fine a point. You know that.

To the uninitiated the columns of the “ London Era” teem with amusing and extraordinary advertisements, but the following offers one of the sweetest chances to lady members of tho theatrical profession I have yet seen. It appears in the “ New York Herald :—"Niblo’s Garden —Wanted—Society young ladies, petite, pretty, and shapely, having the accomplishment of swimming expertly, to enter the aquarium tank with the crocodiles, water snakes, &c., in company with Professor Swan, the Alligator Man, in the speciality act of the * Black Crook.’ Salary tempting. Address by letter only, with enclosure of photographic likeness, Manager, Niblo’s Garden.”

I don’t know what the “ specialty act ” of the “ Black Crook rr may be like, but I should fancy there would be a little diffidence about even the most daring young lady on being introduced at the first rehearsal to tho “ Alligator Man ” and—the rest of the dramatis personas, “ One of tho things which most forcibly impresses a stranger visiting Sydney,” says a correspondent of the Sydney “Town and Country,” “is the narrowness of tbe footpaths, but anyone taking his first walk in our streets does not wonder so much at the small space left for the public to walk on ns at the very bad use they make of it. The rule of tho trottoir, as observed in ell other countries so far advanced in civilisation as to have pavements, appears to be almost unknown in Sydney—in fact, those who endeavor to observe it only manage to make matters worse by their obstinacy in trying to keep on a side of tho path which those whom they meet may have made up their minds to hold at all hazards.”

I’m afraid the Sydney correspondent must be a rather hypercritical pedestrian. He should come to Christchurch for a while. Rules of the trottoir indeed ! why, on Saturday and Sunday evenings it takes a person all their time to get along at all. The larrikins ore completely masters of the position. They have brought the art of blocking the footpath to perfection. As the midshipman said in his diary, their manners are disgusting and their customs worse. I wish King Herod were on tho City Council for a short space, or in default of that monarch some members who would make the laws for pedestrians as stringent as these for the hackney carriages. Oliver Wendell Holmes is said to have used but one pen for all his literary works from 1857 till last September. This statement has been quot d in nearly every paper I have taken up for tho last month. I don’t see anything very remarkable about it myself. Oliver Wendell probably used a pencil for his labors otherwise, the statement is a lie unworthy of reproducing. A Phrenological Professor, which his name is Fraser, has been feeling Te Whiti’s bumps. His lecture on the subject has been going the rounds of the papers. I am much struck with two of the Professor’s remarks. Ho says Te Whiti firmly believes all ho utters, as during the time he speaks the strong faculties carry him away. “If he were an Englishman, he would,” says Mr Fraser, “ be laughed at as a fool or a fanatic.” Ho might have added, and • would have been in in tho asylum or in gaol long ago. The professor also informed his audience that Te Whiti knows little of personal danger: he fears no one, and would die the death of a hero or martyr, and rejoice in tho prospect of it. If tho cranky prophet has any leaning towards martyrdom, the sooner he brings off the event the better. It would bo one of the most complete successes known in New Zealand.

In a recent speech on Reciprocity in the House of Lords, Lord Bateman made the extraordinary statement that “ in New Zealand there were thousands of quarters of wheat annually used as manure or thrown into the sea.” The “ Mark Lane Express” wants to know whether his Lordship is not mistaken, I should say so. Anyhow, if the rest of the facts adduced by Lord Bateman in support of Reciprocity were not more reliable than the above, his speech must have been a very interesting one. Talking of tho Lords, I observe they have passed a motion for the abolition of actions for breach of promise to marry. What a frightful prospect ! and next year Leap Year too. I learn from the Japan “ Gazette” that when the authorities of Yokohama wish to honor a guest or any public man, they instruct the principal native merchants to give him a banquet, for which they are assessed at so many pounds each, according to circumstances. This is a little rough on the merchants, but the custom, with a slight alteration, might be adapted in New Zealand with perhaps considerable advantage. For instance when any distinguished Aboriginal, such as Rewi or Hiroki, required prefentation and such like attentions, it might be made a decree that the Ministry for the time being should do all the parting themselves. In your review on “ Forty Years in New Zealand” the other day, I observe you quote Mr Buller on the subject of Native courtship. “ Contrary to our customs,” says Mr Buller, “ courtship often began with the young woman, Ropa, or squeezing the hand was the token.” Does Mr Buller mean to indicate there is anything unusual in this style of carrying on, because if so, I can’t think he has discovered any thing original in this little custom of the Maori race. I don’t profess to be a judge of “ Ropa,” but a number of young friends of mine, to whom I have referred tho matter, say it’s quite a common occurrence among people here. I myself, the other day, when studying the articles of vertu in tho Museum, saw a fellow squeezing both hands of a -young lady under the pretence of showing her the mummy. His face wore tho aspect you might expect a man’s to present who had lost sixpence and picked up a hundred pound note. I wonder what the young lady’s “ own Mummy ” would have said had she been on hand.

I’m always glad to welcome a new phrase in your journal, but it’s as well at the same time to be able to understand it. I see in a report of a recent festive meeting up country that “ the incoming officers were enthusiastically drunk.” I have heard of being very drunk, drunk and disorderly, drunk and incapable, and many other drunks, but how is a man supposed to shape when he is in the enthusiastic phase of intoxication.

Talking about works of charity on Sunday# a rather peculiar case was tried recently in Sydney in which two men were fined Is each for clipping a horse on Sunday. The information was laid under an Act of Charles 11., which provides that any person above the age of fourteen performing any worldly labor on Sundavs, such labour not being a work of charity or necessity, shall be liable to a fine not exceeding ss. The only alternative by the way is two hours in the public _ stocks. What a number of convictions the police here could obtain under this Act, and how very hard they would find it to nail the restaurant keeper mentioned above doing any work oven of a charitable kind on a Sabbath day.

I hope by the time these lines go to press there will be no unemployed, but should there be any of that class on hand, and should they again have recourse to deputationising, I should recommend them to employ some less expansive individual than the Mr Young who headed them at Sydenham the other day. Mr Young should remember that bounce is not argument, and it is not always ho will haye to meet people of so forbearing a nature as the Sydenham works committee. It’s a risky sort of game is cattle dealing. The great thing is to know how to buy. You can easily sell- Also you can be sold, as young Fattstock was the other day. It was his first buy, and a three-cow purchase. He placed the animals amongst some his own in his paddocks. The fences of this enclosure were not too secure, und he was a good bit troubled with trespassing cattle belonging to his neighbors. A week or two went by, and riding through the cattle he spotted three strangers. Presuming they belonged to Squiggins, a hardened trespasser, who lived near, he interviewed Squiggins, and said if the cattle were not removed in an hour he would pound them. Squiggins, as usual, denying all knowledge of them, Fattstock pounded the cows, and was rather surprised two days later to learn from a friend that he had pounded his own animals. I understand Fattstock is occasionally reminded at the yards of this little incident even unto this day.

Is not that a rather peculiar decision of tho Royal Commission on the wreck of the Taupo? The harbor master is censured because the buoy got loose, and as it appears wandered promiscuously about on the face of the waters. Captain Cromarty is condemned because be had never seen the buoy in any other place ; at the same time the report says 11 had tho buoy been in its proper place it could not have failed to attract the attention of tho captain to the danger.” Assuming that such is tho duty of buoys, I should say Captain Cromarty ie an aggrieved seaman.