CAMBRIDGE STUDENTS’ JOKE.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXII, Issue 841, 19 May 1910, Page 4

CAMBRIDGE STUDENTS’ JOKE.

UNDERGRADUATES’ HOAX. Cambridge is laughing at the latest undergraduate hoax, in which two members of the Magdalene College, dressed as ladies, attempted to attend a performance at the New Theatre of the musical comedy, “ Dear Little Denmark.” It is a strict rule of the theatre management (says a writer in an English exchange) that undergraduates may not purchase tickets for stage-boxes unless accompanied by ladies or some other satisfactory chaperone. On a recent Saturday tickets for a party of five in a box were purchased in the name of a well-known Cambridge resident. Just after the performance commenced, two ” ladies,” accompanied by three undergraduates, drove up to the theatre in taxicabs. The ladies were dressed in white silk, with richly-embroidered cloaks. Over their crisply curling tresses, white lace theatre wraps were drawn and bunched up loosely at the throats. Their skirts, daintly held clear ot the ground by white-gloved fingers, revealed glistening high-heeled patent leather shoes and the slim lines of neat ankles and shapely iusteps, veiled with silk open-work stockings. All had gone well so far. The disguise was perfect. In the vestibule the manager of the theatre, Mr W. B. Redfern, had been passed within a tew feet. It was only by accident as the ladies were ascending the staircase that the hoax was discovered. Mr Redfern, who happened to be following in the rear of the party, heard one of the ladies, as she tripped on her skirt, give vent to a short, sharp exclamation of annoyance in one syllable.

“Her” voice was an unmistakable bass voice. The manager stepped in front of the party at the top of the stairs and declined to allow them to enter the box. The “ ladies/' turning in retreat, took the stairs with very mannish strides two at a time. In the vestibule the party managed to evade a proctor who entered the main entrance of the theatre as the “ ladies ” and their male friends dashed out of a side entrance and scrambled into two taxicabs which were in waiting.