ALONE IN CHRISTCHURCH.

Globe, Volume XXIII, Issue 2208, 24 March 1881, Page 3

ALONE IN CHRISTCHURCH.

[PEOM THIS " PRESS.”]

I have just arrived in Ohristohuroh, and am looking for something to do. My board and lodging are guaranteed for a couple of weeks. At the end of that time I shall be utterly destitute, unless remunerative employment may have offered in the meantime. Partly through improvidence, partly through lending money to needy persons, but mainly through the non-arrival of moneys expected from home, I find myself in a dilemma. Without money, without relations, I am alone in Ohristohuroh. My local acquaintances know that I have had money, and might therefore be the less inclined to assist me. lam well educated, as the term goes; am entitled to that vague term, “ a Home University man; ” have won first classical honors; am fairly acquainted with French. Of commerce 1 know nothing. _ I cannot get a ohanoe at Press-work, of which I have done a good deal and satisfactorily. What am I to do ?

Daily I scan the “ Wanted ” in the morning papers. These announcements are becoming a farce. One tradesman wants it known that he sells boots cheap, another has a lino in fruit, and eo on. There are but two or three legitimate) wanteds. These I read diligently, and they usually give me cause to regret that I am neither “ a strong, healthy girl, about 16,” nor "a miller, with a knowledge of oatmeal.” Either of these qualifications will secure a situation. lam not of powerful frame. Is it practicable for mo to sally into the country in quest of work, and compete with trained laborers, of whom 1 understand there is an over abundance ? I can give excellent references as to character. A country editor, with whom I was lately employed for six months, has sent me flattering fetters of introduction to business men in Christchurch. They promise to do their best. They have themselves no opening for me, nor hare their friends. The time is passing. What can I do ? I have been obliged to pledge various articles in order to raise money. Now that I have no negotiable property left, there rises the gloomy prospect of feeding on reflection, an unsatisfying meal, I grant that I have not been careful, that I have forfeited excellent opportunities, that the prospect of a remittance from Homo has been unduly relied on. But am Ito have no loophole of escape from present difficulties ? Does this city offer no inducement in the way of employment by which one can redeem the past, at least in part ? Scores of times I have helped others with presents of money. Is it hopeless in my turn to look for employment, with even meagre payment ? 1 have asked several men of business for work; I have thought of going a round of visits to the various hotels, asking the several managers if they required a man to peel potatoes. Silly and ill-timed pride has restrained me for a day or two from this the seemingly inevitable course. One day, in desperation, I thought I could force myself to be funny, and write accordingly. In an assumed, jovial mood, I repaired to the Public Library. Although ostensibly a member of the public, I am not a member of the Public Library. Therefore, after reading the notice on the inner door, I remained in the outer room. This precaution was wise. Another stranger, apparently poor, certainly poorly clad, took a book from the outer room and betook himself to the inner. He had not read the notice. About half a minute elapsed before he emerged, trying to look unconcerned, as if he had not been officially informed of his intrusion. Presently he left the building. I presume he would not have oared to either apply for a letter of introduction, or for exceptional permission to read in the reference room. Well, I remained in the outer room. Its sitting accommodation is circumscribed. There are four chairs, all originally cane bottomed. Three were occupied. The fourth fell to my lot. It was rot in statu quo, a large aperture suggesting that some scientific director was instituting experiments as to man’s capacity for sitting on a vacuum.

Being poor, lam unusually sensitive. I dislike being experimented upon by strangers, and think the truth of the old proverb, that Nature abhors a vacuum, has been sufficiently demonstrated. My chair being uncomfortable, I took a fresh survey, and spied out a ladder, double, of moderate height. On this I perched myself to think out an amusing essay, which was to bring in a guinea, ana render the anonymous author as famed (and as rich) as the author of “ Pickwick Papers.” I hod just elaborated a tolerable joke about a fisherman whom I noticed the other night lashing the Avon with a many-pronged fly, designed to catch tront by the tail, when a lady whispered loudly to her daughter, “ I suppose he thinks nobody wants the books except himself.” “ It’s too odious,” responded the daughter, looking at my not quite new trousers, and giggling. I uncoiled my long legs, and descended the ladder. Mamma rolled it away to the “ Fiction ” shelves. The daughter looked on, and snappishly told her mother what book to climb for. Thereupon, I bethought mo that I should return to xny despised chair, and indite a joke on the thraldom in which colonial daughters not infrequently hold their mothers. I took some paper from my pocket, and looked for ink. There was none, and I ascertained afterwards that, had there been any, I should not have been at liberty to nee it. My chair was already occupied by an abject looking person, who avoided the abyss, poising himself sideways on the edge. He shifted about continually, like a yacht tacking ’gainst wind, and appeared to be, literally, on the verge of misery. Determined not to be baulked in my project of original composition, I repaired to a window, placed my paper on an adjoining shelf, and wrote in pencil. But my jokes, standing out in the poor relief of lead pencil, seemed [remarkably vapid, and one by one I scored them out. My thoughts wandered from things funny to things mundane. I began to add up a quantity of figures. "If one can earn a pound a week by writing as an outsider for the papers, and if one can bachelorise at fifteen shillings a week, how much can one save in three years, making, of course, a reduction for clothes, tooth paste, plate collections on Sunday, and so on ?” After several solutions of this and other equally abstruse problems, my unpleasant position recn-red to my mind, and half unconsciously I pencilled these remarks partly on the window shelf and partly on my knee, when, by a rapid manoeuvre, I had contrived to outflank two advancing competitors for a vacated chair. My experience goes to prove that only truth is to be written with a pencil. A Tobpedord AtJOM. P.S.—Since writing the above I received an answer to an application which I had made for mastership in a school. Tho reply acquaints me with the fact that “ another person ” has been recommended for the appointment. I suppose a clause in the Education Act necessitates the advertising of vacancies, but I have reason to believe that the various Boards usually have another person prominently in their mind’s eye before they advertise. A. T. A.