THE LOAFER IN THE STREET.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 2133, 24 December 1880, Page 4

THE LOAFER IN THE STREET.

I observe by Australian files that the frisky -veteran, Mr Hoskins, is playing Shakespeare in Melbourne. Touchstone was the part allotted to our great all round actor, but the performance was not a great success. Indeed, one critic describes it as “ one of the sorriest spectacles ever witnessed on the stage.” The theatrical oritioof the “ Australasian ” lots the veteran very kindly down, probably for the sake of old times. He also informs bis readers of a fact that will doubtless surprise How Zealanders. Mr Hoskins is going to take a FAREWELL BENEFIT. His kindheartod critic, in a very friendly notice of this performance, says—“Mr Hoskins belongs to a race of actors who are passing away, and of whom there are no successors.” This is perhaps as well, let them pass. The race of actors the veteran belonged to was the “Half Salary race,” and in this respect he certainly, in Hew 'Zealand at any rate, has made the “forms of the drama thoroughly understood.” With all his little peculiarities, however, we miss him much. New Zealand for the last few months has lacked a something. Until I noticed the announcement in the “ Australasian,” I could not quite think what it was. Now I know. I missed the usual monthly advertisement that “Mr Hoskins’ will tike a farewell benefit prior to his departure for England.” Dome back to us onoe again Hoskins, and play Pangloss, Hamlet, Affable Hawk, Ohrysos, Dazzle, Macbeth, Eiohelieu, Charles Surface, Borneo, Claude Melnotte, Young Marlow, and Jack Sheppard, in a round of farewells through Wellington Auckland, Hawke’s Bay, Christchurch, Dunedin, Invercargill, Leeston, and Kaiapoi, but only onoo Hoskins, only onoe more, sweet youth. Some times since old Tafliings came to me with the following advertisement, out from the “Globe”:—“Send twelve stamps, date of birth, and a lock of your hair to Leo and your future will be Old Tuff had sent his stamps, and got his future sketched out beautifully, but tho affair was, as I pointed out him, as crooked as possible. “ Tuff,” I said, “ this capillary horoscope of yours won’t fit anyhow. You know you’re as bald as a jug, and the look of hair you sent came out of your wig. Tha future you’ve paid for belongs to some other fellow’s hair.” Thus it befel that Tuff was sad, and though the prediction of the seer said nothing about it, he got locked up for inebriety. The ceremony of holy matrimony is always attended, I understand, with some little expense. Some people, however, get through muoh more easily than others. In this connection there comes to me a good story of a marriage that recently took place in an upcountry township not one hundred miles from Christchurch. The pair were gentle sweetnesses of the yokel species, and oombinedly they pulled through their responses, &0., with moderate success. After fixing their autographs at the conclusion of the service, tho happy bridegroom inquired of the minister what his charge was, and on receiving as on answer that it was quite optional, the yokel, producing a colonial robert from a capacious pocket, made a graceful exit with the remark —“ There you are, parson, there’s a drink for yourself and tho old woman.” And even then the parson wasn’t happy. The committee of the Kaiapoi Borough Council must be a most extraordinary body of men. I arrive at this conclusion from tho report, as given in the pages of a contemporary of yours, of a Kaiapoi Council meeting. In this report, I find the following perplexing item :—“ The committee recommend that the Council purchase the wench now on the bridge for £6.” And it was proposed and carried, “ that they purchase the wenoh.” It seems almost too delicate a matter to enlarge on much, but I should like to know a little more about this extraordinary purchase. Is the wenoh still on the bridge, 1 wonder ? The beneath is rather a curious way of putting an obituary notice : “ Mr , one of the oldest and most respected residents in , was found sitting in a chair in his office at seven o’clock on Friday morning.” Writers should be careful. Such a paragraph as the above would lead many readers completely astray. “ Keeper’s Night Dog for Sale, Black Ball Mastiff, height 28in., age 2i years 5 price £10; thoroughly broken to his work 5 will attack a man at command ; week’s trial allowed. Apply to O. Watts, Hoar Cross, Burton-on-Trent.”

Now, from reading the above I should say Mr O. Watts must bo a most thorough and obliging man. His dog will attack a man at command, and the attacked party can have a week’s trial of this interesting game. This is what I call giving a man every chance of knowing what his intended purchase may be like.

A very interesting publication is that of the Hew Zealand Trade Froteotion Society. As the boy said of the dictionary, it changes its subject rather often ; but it’s a useful journal. All papers have their nice mottoes, which are often as mal-apropos as those selected by monied men who have only discovered their right to heraldic honors very late in life. Tho aphorism I read every morning at the top ef your own valued journal, for instance, is a deliciously big funniment as compared with some of the sentiments I have occasionally seen expressed in its columns—but this is strictly between ourselves. Tho motto, so far as 1 can judge, of the Froteotion Society, is “ Private and Confidential.”

This is, I should presume, intended for what the immortal Mr A. Ward would have called “sarkasm.” I judge so from the fact that having been present on one or two occasions when subscribers have opened their circulars, the hurried style in which they rushed to peruse them seemed to show apart from ordinary business anxiety a pleasant wish to experience that soothing feeling Mr Boohefonoauld declares is attendant on the misfortunes of our best friends. I wish I could utilise this journal a little more, but it would be unfair to so many rising men, and personalities are always a mistake. But the oft-quoted remark of Mr H. Flaoous, risum teneatit amici, •oems somehow suitable when I observe that when, according to a prevalent custom in this country, a man makes over certain property to the wife of his bosom,the “ amount” entered in the columns of this periodical

as “ natural love and affection.” This, I contend, is really a sweet, romantic and charming way of putting it. It exhibits an amount of sentiment I should scarcely have expected to find in a journal of this kind. _ Then the way registrating people describe their profession* is often exquisite. On one occasion a wellknown colonist described himeolf as “ a gentleman farmer and a sporting gentleman.” Another (a metallician) as “ a gentleman sportsman.” You would hardly believe the. fun a man could get out of this publication. A few days since I mot an old sporting correspondent of my acquaintance. _ His temperament was very milled. On enquiry I; discovered that the reader of the paper to which he had the honor to belong had made a very sweet mistake, A certain horoe had been spoken of by the writer as “ penalised.” The reader passed the animal into print as “paralysed.” On making complaint to the reader, the latter—who is a bit of a sport himself —merely remarked, with a moat unrepentant grin—“ Well, it don’t much matter, if he ain’t paralysed, he jolly soon will he," I was taken out myself very much in the same style some years ago. I had mado allusion in one of my brilliant productions to the two daughters of the horseleaoh who cry continually “ Give, Give.” In the morning I found that these ladies were supposed to cry continually “ Gin, Gin.” I felt murderous, but it came to nothing. I expect one gets used to most things in this world.