SYDNEY LARRIKINISM.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXX, Issue 3782, 11 January 1908, Page 4

SYDNEY LARRIKINISM.

Passengers who arrived at Wellington by the Mara n; a this week and who were in Sydney during the recent holidays, paint rather a sad picture of the conduct of people in the city at holiday time. Mr T. Dwan says that larrikinism was rampant. He adds that a new instrument of horror known as a detonating stick was carried hy hoodlums. These sticks were struck on the footpath behind unsuspecting people, a noise resembling thesimultaueousdischargeof a dozen guns being produced, and many citizens were put in a state of nervous prostration. The sale of these sticks has now been prohibited, and the use of them has been made an offence against the bylaws. Regarding the doings on New Year’s Eve, the Sydney Morning Herald says:— “The opinion was forcibly expressed that the police authorities will be compelled, in the interests of public safety and public morality, to make, stringent provisions in order to prevent a recurrence of such scenes. It is difficult to realise, that in a big city like Sydney, brilliantly illuminated by electricity and (patrolled by police, it is possible for respectable women to be. indecently assaulted on every hand by large bodies of-young well dressed men who on 364 days of the year are regarded as eminently respectable. The conduct of the large proportion of the crowds is without parallel in the history of the Commonwealth. One of the police officers, when spoken to about bonfires started by larrikins, said that ‘ while the pushes ’ were allowed to light the fires it would be impossible to preserve order, as the fires formed centres around whicn the crowds congregated.”