AUCKLAND HAPPENINGS.

Kaipara and Waitemata Echo, 6 March 1919, Page 3

AUCKLAND HAPPENINGS.

[From Our Own Correspondent!

TRAMWAY TROUBLES

The long-standing dispute between the Auckland Tramway Company and the cai-men is of course a thing of the past, and everything, as the' man- in the comic opera sings, is "as right as right can be." How long this blissful state of things will continue is another story. Possibly until the men resume the " goslow " tactics which proved so successful in this case. People, generally, took but a languid interest in the question of the wages handed out by the Company until the cars began to slow down, and a journey usually performed ira five or six minutes occupied half-an-hour. It was then that the travelling public began to sit up and take notice. It was a little rough upon that same public, by the way, that it should have been put to serious inconvenience and annoyance simply because the drivers and conductors had fallen out with the Company. But the course adopted by the men meant victory for them, and won in two days what weeks of talky-talky had failed to accomplish. Of course it is not the Company that will suffer as the result of the concessions just made. It is the people who use the trams that will have to pay the piper in the shape of increased fares.

THE HUNS IN OUR MIDST

Well done, Devonport Borough Council! At the last meeting of this body it adopted a motion urging upon the Government the necessity of repatriating immediately all German prisoners, military and civil, interned An New Zealand. In submitting the motion the Mayor of Dovonport remarked that " it was a question whether some of these men who had been working in sympathy with, and probably receiving the pay of, a Government which had outraged civilisation, should be allowed, to enjoy the civil privileges :of the^ ".community," I canriotVsee that;.this is open to question; at all. •; The Germans where ever met with have proved themselves to be-utterly^without principle^-thoroughly unscrupulous, destitute of honour, cowardly treacherous, and loathsome. They have committed crimes which are unforgetable and unforgivable, and have forfeited all rights to be treated a's human beings, Let those that dishonor New Zealand by remaining in it be sent packing v/as soon as possible back to the infamous country to which they belong, and if the New Zealand Government refuses to repatriate these men at the earliest opportunity it will deserve to lose the confidence of even those who still support.,

MR SEMPLE AGA^IN

They were discussing Mr R. Semple's Christchurch speech at a certain Auckland Club the other evening, and they summed up the position in this way : If Mr Semple did say that he was in sympathy with the Bolsheviks, and* that if he were in Russia he would join Trotzky, and Lenin, that if he were in Ireland he would be a Sinn Feiner, and that if he were in Germany he would be an ardent Spartacist, then he is clearly not a fit and proper person to be a member of Parliament. But Mr Semple denies that he uttered the words attributed to him, and declares that he was delibrately misrepresented py the ''Press" newspaper. In that case he was misrepresented by the f-Lyttleton times 'as well, because both papers practically in their reports of what took place at Mr Semple's meeting, and the Ghrjstchurch Journalists' Union declares that ample evidence of the accuracy pf the report to which IVfr Semple takes exception is available. Clearly the matter is one that must not be allowed to remain whepe it is. It must be cleared up, one way or the other. "Either Mr Semple i s a much Injured man QV he is not fit to write "M.IV' aft©? his name.

KISSING.

The report ot a lecture or address by a Sydney parson— and which report was reproduced in an Auckland daily paper—has created a good-deal of amusement here. The lecturer referred in the course of his remarks to the danger of promiscuous osculation and "declared that if people would insist on kissing each other they Should never indulge in that way Without using " a piece of germproof 'antiseptic gauze." Isn't tliat del|cioi^V Faqcy a young

and ardent lover who has just persuaded his best girl to say " yes,'' and is about to seal the compact with a kiss, suddenly remembering that he hadn't got his germ-proof antiseptic gauze with.him, and that consequently the .fond embrace must be deferred! Sanitarians may denounce the kissing habit as vehemently as they please, but I rather fancy the demand for germ-proof antiseptic gauze for kissing purposes-.is likely to be limited, all the same.

WHY, CERTAINLY!

The proposal that the local merchants should receive compensation for their losses in connection with the Makura shipment of Canadian apples, which, as you know, were carried on to Sydney at the time of the epidemic in Auckland, and brought back here long after they should have been on the local market, is causing sundry fruit-growers to protest. . " The merchants, auctioneer, and retailers get the profits, not the growers," writes one orchardist to a local paper, and this gentleman (as well as other members of the fraternity) appears to think that instead of so much consideration being extended to the merchants it is the growers that should be assisted to-secure better prices for their fruit. That is a reasonable contention. And it is not the growers alone who have to suffer .—it is the consumers as well. The middleman it is who scoops the pool every time, and until the growers take concerted energetic action this unfortunate state of things will continue. The remedy is proper organisation and co-operation. And that remedy has never yet been applied.

"THE PLACE WHERE THE

WOOL OUGHT TO GROW

It would, of course, be very rude to tell a lady to " keep her hair on," but that is precisely what many Auckland woman and girls are trying all they know to do at the present time. The fall in hair is one of the after-effects of the "flu," and the local hair-dressers and chemists are busied in answering enquiries and prescribing treatment. Women find the hair come out in. handfuls, and numbers of them are almost as bald "on top" as. a billiard-ball or anew-laid egg. The barbers recommend close-cropping, and you are oonstantly meeting men with hair so short as to suggest that they must have just " come out." The chemists must be coining money in exchange for bottles of assorted " restorers " at three-and-six a time. Truly it is an ill wind,

etc., etc

THE MORMONS,

The Press Association wire appearing in our daily papers recently regarding Mormon activity in England has attracted some attention locally because this province is visited every now and again by emissaries from Salt Lake City intent on [securing converts, and I believe there is not a town or settlement in New Zealand which the disciples of the late lamented Brighanl Young are not in the habit of visiting from time to time \n the way of business. It would be well if the misguided women and girls who are tempted by the stories told by these "missionaries" to go to Utah, would, before they decide on a step affecting their whole future lives and their happiness and wellbeing read a novel from the pen of the late Mrs Henry Wood entitled " Verner's Pride." Fiction of the better kind frequently contains a good deal of fact. This novel is a case in point, and any girl who thinks about joining the community of " the Latter Day Saints" should make a point of reading \^ it may save her from much misery.

THROUGH BELGIUM TOWARD THE RHINE. Thus Captain A. D. Mcßae describes his adventures in getting to his battalion after returning from hospital in England : November 25, 1918. I got back to the Battalion a few days ago after quite a wonderful trip up from Boulogne, the last hundred miles or so being done by hopping the old motor lorries. I spent the first night in Valenciennes and the next in the famous Mons. The towns, and cities here are a mass of flags, floral arches, etc. It seemed quite strange when nearing the old battle ground not to hear any guns, and I think it made it seem all the more desolate if possible. The roads for miles on either side of the old zone are crowded with old men, women and children, pushing wheelbanows, pulling carts and waggons, or carrying great buadles, on their way to their old homes, although in many cases it will be but the place where their home used to be. Many will not even be able to find a vestige of the town or village left. What some of these wonderful French people are going through (smiling with the knowledge that they are to be free of the Hun) the world at large will never appreciate. The roads, as we siow march through Belgium towards the Rhine, are ever lined with old men (the others are in their own army), women and children, and all seem to have learned the word " welcome." Floral arches decorate the streets, and great banners bear some welcome Belgian, French, English or a mixture. Women rush out with cups of tea or coffee to the boys as we pass, and when we stop for the nig!it they do their utmost to make us comfortable.'' It is often quite touching to see the older people standing to weloome us with tears of joy running down their cheeks, Yesterday when nearing a little town we were met with a band of some dozen pieces, no member, of , which I should judge was a day under 60 years. They played "Oh Canada," and "God Save the King," and not too badly either.