ALL SORTS OF PEOPLE

Free Lance, Volume I, Issue 4, 28 July 1900, Page 3

ALL SORTS OF PEOPLE

MB ALEXANDER GRANT, the recently appointed railway manager at Wellington, has settled down to his new duties in this city. Much regret was expressed at his departure from Auckland, by the staff, press, and public alike, the feeling shown being an excellent testimony to the popularity of Mr Grant in the northern city. By the way, it is a quarter of a century since Mr Grant first became a railway traffic manager, his first appointment having been at Dunedin, where he is still held in kindly remembrance and regard. • • • Mr J. H. Upton, an Auckland merchant, made a good point the other day when arguing against the tyrannical Chambers of Commerce Bill recently introduced by Mr "Ward : It has been admitted on all sides that had the Boers at Johannesburg permitted the single right of free meeting, all the difficulties would have been superable ; none would have been insuperable. But, because the oligarchy prevented the holding of free meetings, they were enabled to carry their measures without fair and reasonable criticism. That had caused one of the,* bloodiest wars that had yet taken place. This Bill was precisely the same thing. It was an attempt to prevent free meetings and free criticism, and it was every citizen's duty to protest against such a thing. • * • Mr Jackson Palmer, M.H.R., tells a little story about how he struck his only dividend at the Hutt races on Saturday last. With his pockets filled with nonwinning tickets, and reduced to his last £1, he was standing near a group of girls who were studying the race-book intently. " Look here," said one of them (a complete stranger) : •' Mr J. Palmer's Hauriri. That must be Mr Jackson Palmer, the member. Let's go on it." They went on it, though they were wrong about the identity of the owner. " However," relates Mr Palmer, " if it was good enough for them to back me it was good enough for me to back myself, and that's how I struck my only winner in Hauriri." • • * A bitter political opponent of the Premier, according to the Gisborne Telephone, had a horse which he disliked, and as a term of opprobrium he called it Nick Seddon. But Nick proved such a grand and faithful worker, and so far outstripped all the flash horses, thf.t the owner, being more a lover oi horses than of politics, changed his views and renamed the noble animal Richard the Great, as a compliment to the political leader who has now his staunch support. » * # Lord Roberts is in fellowship with one of the straitest sects of Noncomformity. He belongs to the Strict Baptists, and whenever he is in London may be seen among the worshippers in the little chapel of the denomination in Gowerstreet. It is a noticeable thing that religious men in the army are very frequently associated with the most pronounced forms of evangelical Calvinism.

The Hon. J. M. Twoiney blossomed out; as a delegate to the Trotting Conference last week. He represented Temuka, and the multiplicity of his questions during the proceedings suggested that a bound copy of the Eules of Trotting does not obtain a place in his library. There was a marked air of impatience about the honourable gentleman, and he flitted in and out of the debating chamber, sometimes to attend to "important business," he said, and on other occasions to woo gentle Lady Nicotine. When the allocation of totalisator permits came on, however, the murder was out — he wanted one for his dear Temuka, " the garden of sport in Canterbury," and as the club had been racing without one in the past, the delegates, after listening to his eloquent appeal, gave him his wish, and he went to bed happy. # • * That amorous divim'ty student, J. G. McLeod, whose lovelorn sweetheart scored a century against him at Invercargill recently — owing to his having broken a promise to wed — is now in the toils of the church authorities at Dunedin. His case has caused quite a flutter in clerical circles ; various ecclesiastics of importance are to be consulted, and a report drawn up which will be gravely considered by the Council. It's astonishing what trouble a few letters and a promise will get a fellow into. The last gentleman of the cloth that the writer knew of who got into a similar dire difficulty threw off his coat and went gold-digging ; then he went to the dogs, and is now porter at a Sydney restaurant. • • • A certain fashionably-dressed personage of taking manners, who obtruded himself on Wellington society not long ago, used to be a hot-pie vendor in Melbourne, and until recently carried a bookmaker's bag on suburban racecourses there. * • • Lorenzo — for short — has a good dog. He lives near the Destructor, and the dog has never been through that machine. Lorenzo thought he had a bite — not from the dog — the other day, when a friend asked him to lend the dog for a day's shooting. Lorenzo, who is a goodnatured kind of fellow, did so, and was promised a share of the game certain to result from a shooting expedition. The shoot came off. It was on a Sunday — the better the day, etc. There wasn't much game, the dog wasn't badly hit, but Lorenzo has been poulticing his leg for a few days. He is game no longer* * # m Trooper Watkins, of the Fifth Contingent, writing from Beira, says — " Wanganui shoemaker advertises ' nothing like leather,' but, now that I have tasted and handled buffalo beef, I could contradict him." According to Watkins, Beira must be a haven of bliss for the barmaid masher. There are some fifty hotels in the place — they call them " bars" —run by women (from twelve to twenty in every bar) of all nationalities, except blacks. Fancy a bar with twenty barmaids ; what a treat for the local dudesWe get touches of the romance of war even in Masterton, says the Daily Times. Did not a certain elderly doctor, when he heard that his son was wounded at Mafeking, throw up his practice here, don a khaki uniform and sail for Africa. Then did he not traverse the continent till he reached Mafeking, pick up his invalid lad and carry him off to London. The son is one of the heroes of Mafeking, but if we had the distribution of war medals we are disposed to think that we should give oneto the plucky parent as well as to the brave son.

Dunedin supplied the most persistent speech maker at the New Zealand Racing Conference in the Hon. George McLean. He opposed everything with consistent regularity. Possessing as he does strong Conservative ideas, the honourable gentleman expressed horror at the idea of metropolitan clubs — especially Dunedin---being deprived of any of their autocratic functions, and although he occasionally stood alone, he rapped out " no " every, time, and called for a division. When the shades of evening fell, and someone proposed an adjournment for dinner, everybody glanced instinctively at Mr McLean. It fetched him ; he rose to the occasion and — opposed it. He said they could work on for a good half-hour before adjourning, and this the Conference did. # # * Did you hear of the way in which a brisk and promising young accountant found himself in danger of having to spend a night in the company of rats and mice in a city warehouse ? He had occasion to stay late in the office in question, auditing the books, and was the • last person left on the premises. When he was ready to go, he discovered that the main door, which fastened with a springbolt, had been pulled together with the key on the outside, and that he was a prisoner — hopelessly barred in, and in a lonely street where he might have shouted himself hoarse without being heard. Here was a pretty situation. But he was a man of resource, and bethought himself of the telephone. Einging up a friend who lived •within a few hundred yards, he summoned him to the rescue, and soon found himself set free, and at liberty to go home to tea or undertake enterprises of more-pith and moment. * * • Apropos of the Websier-Deller slander case it is said that although Mr Deller won his case he will still have to pay nearly £100 in costs. Defending a libel case is no joke. • • • A London bank clerk, who is so down on his luck over Melbourne way as to constitute him an authority on the subject of impecuniosity, was pained to hear recently that his New Zealand friends were aware of his penniless condition. A bright idea struck him. Strolling along to a friendly photographer's, he had a dozen photos taken, and sent them to this colony. The picture showed him to be irreproachably dressed, wearing a morning coat and silk topper, with high fencing round his neck. He had borrowed the outfit from an everobliging " uncle," and after being dressed as a thousand-a-year swell for half-an-hour, he doffed the toggery, resumed his own faded attire, and faced a cold, pitiless world once again. # * • Mr Jw-Clernent Wragge had a most meteorological reception in Wellington — the loneliest servant that ever hung a wet coat behind a loor. Before leaving Australia for New Zealand he wrote to our greatest technocologist offering to share the proceeds of two intellectual lectures with the Technical School authorities, if the latter would undertake the management. The matter was referred to Sir James Hector, who refused to recognise his fellow weather-prophet — probably because Wragge is first eminently practical, and then learned. So Wragge didn't get so much as an acknowledgment of his liberal offer from the Technical School. Then, when in quarantine, he wrote offering similar terms to the Thorndon Anglicans — and again no answer. Eepeated the offer to Presbyterians, and wasn't wanted. Finally gave two lectures in a Wesleyan schoolroom for his own sole benefit, and reaped about £30 or £40.

" Cantab," who says he was interested in the " Conciliation" photo, published in the Lance recently, writes that Chairman Crewes was a conspicuous figure in Christchurch for at least ten years before coining to Wellington. Crewes was a keen politician in those days, and opposed Sir Julius Vogel, the popular idol. Challenged to run against Sir Julius for a seat in the House, Crewes took up the gauntlet on the understanding that his expenses would be paid. This was agreed to, and exciting times followed. Crewes was beaten by three to one, but he gave Vogel such a shaking up that the Great Financier no longer remained a hero in Christchurch. * • * Whispered in a quiet, humorous way, that a certain faultlessly-dressed citizen, who 'looks like one of the courteous gentleman lunatics a fellow meets with at an asylum dance, was kissing and caressing the perfumed, silken hair o£ an impetuousyoung charmer at the side bar of a local hotel, when the girl's brother and her alleged lover suddenly popped in. < It was an unpleasant situation, and the guilty individual wished that he had been born a, piece of chalk. The reddened fairy introduced the trio, and upon one of the newcomers remarking that it was a cold day, the tailor's model remarked, with averted orbs, that it was, and then wished them, good morning. m hey parted without shaking hands, and there was a fine old pantomime when he went out. * * * For modesty commend us to Mr Fred Haybittle. He was asked, ' to act as auctioneer at the New Zealand stall at the Patriotic Bazaar, and wasn't a bit staggered by. the fact that Dan Leno/the funniest actor in London, was going to sell at the next stall. "I am not afraid even of the great Dan." Certainly not. Why Fred wouldn't mind doing a turn at the Empire, or challenging comparisons with Dan Leno as first comedian in a Drury Lane panto. Nothing like your young New Zealander for confidence to keep his own end up, as Fred puts it. And after all, joking apart, we have seen hundreds of professionals who were not a patch on. Fred as comedians. * # * One of those queer meetings at Antipodes that give zest to colonial life. Not long ago, two families that had struck up acquaintance in Wellington, were engaged in social talk. Then it suddenly flashed upon them (through the advent of two elder members who had not met till that day) that both came from the same part of the Old Country. Next, they found that they had mutual acquaintances at Home. And to their delight, they discovered that though they had never suspected it till that moment, a cousinship existed between members of the two households. To make the coincidence more complete, two of the young ladies who now learned so strangely of their blood relationship were already betrothed to two brothers, and they have since cemented their relationship by marriage. * • • Another " John " opinion on the position in China, this time from one who has been in the colonies a good many years, but not long enough to lose what he considers to be patriotic principles. " Yah, Chineeman over China heap fool letter Eulopean man Melican man come long sit down on top China, do what him like. Why no keep him out all-a-gedder. Why for no? Me keep em outsi, my word, allee samee New Zealand man do keep Chineeman outsi' here— we put him big poll tax on evely Englicee soldier man, evely one Lussian soldier man, evely one damn Melican man. Me keepee all outsi' — my word !"

Mr George Hunter, the well-known Hawke's Bay squatter, ousted from his seat last election by Mr C. Hall, rarely misses a race meeting at the Hutt, a course on which he is proverbially lucky. Mr Hunter is a rare sport, and a good judge of the fleet-footed silk carrier. On opening day of the W.R.C. meeting he noticed that a horse of his own breeding, Wairaka, was racing, and loyally stood by him to the extent of a pound, receiving JE34 odd dividend. A well-known Masterton man is said to have had three tickets on the son of Wonderland, and took home £102 odd for his better half to bargain -with. • * * " The last job of varnishing that I did I didn't do — I got an outside man to do it 1" This was the lucid explanation of an employer before the Arbitration Court concerning a job which it had been said had been done in his factory. He was a Scot, too! • • » Mr Ell spoke the other night of an answer that would bring a blush of shame to the Premier's cheek. We would like to get a copy of that answer. It would be useful to nail over the office door to scare away book fiends and political women. • • • John Burns is a stiff-hearted antiImperialist. He says a '! hysterical change " has come over the English nation, and that the man in the street was " khaki-clad, khaki-mad, and khakibad." Also, that " when our troops returned, we should have in England 150,000 uniformed Boers." John must be going dotty. It's not very likely that English soldiers who have had personal experience of the white flag treachery of the pious Boer will gush over that worthy when they return to England. • • • The Hon. James Carroll " farewelled " at both the Trotting and Racing Conferences last week, and handed over the reins to new Colonial Secretary. Ward, who in a pretty little jam-tart speech advised them to be good boys and maintain i;he standard of sport. He made it pretty plain that he would not be cajoled into granting permits to clubs which did not deserve them ; consequently a number of new sporting institutions whose promoters relied on private influence if the Conference didn't favour their applications will probably find themselves in the wet. The new , Northern Trotting Club, engineered by persons connected with the Electrical Tramway Syndicate, was refused a permit and placed on probation for a year — a very nasty knock indeed which will not be relished by the influential crowd behind it. Auckland Trotting Club, elbowed out of Potter's Paddock by the promoters of the new concern, will likely race at Sylvia Park in future. • m • At the Yorkshire Society's dinner the other evening little Wilson, ex-member for the Suburbs and editor of the Times weekly, told some yarns of youthful days spent in the woolly town of Bradford. They were in the broadest dialect, and greatly amused the Tykes. Referring to the Yorkshire lasses he said they were very fond of courting. One evening Wilson and a friend were walking along a road by the side of which was a cemetery. Hearing a noise somewhat resembling the pulling of a big boot out of wet clay they looked over the wall, and beheld a young couple spooning on a tombstone. After an extra noisy kiss the swain asked -his girl, " Eh lass, ah wonder what owd Brown would say if he cud only pop oop from under this gravestone and see us ? " " Say ? what would he say ?" replied the girl, " why, he'd say quick enough, *Eh, Jim Barraclough, but that's a real lucky young fellow to have t' bonniest girl in all Bradforth a sittin 1 aside of tha. Kiss her agean, lad, kiss her agean.' " Not a bad yarn, but it has a chestnutty smack about it. • * * Sir Gordon Sprigg is again Premier at the Cape, with a majority of six. This means that the Afrikander Bond influence has suffered a terrible slump, for Sprigg was knocked out three years ago by the combined Hoffmeyr - Schreiner power. Like many other colonial politicians Sprigg was originally a reporter. He started life on the House of Commons reporting staff, and, like Rhodes, went to South Africa for his health. He has been five times Premier of Cape Colony, and is a strong Imperialist. He is the son of a Baptist minister at Ipswich in sleepy Suffolk, but there is no sleepiness about Sprigg. On the contrary, he is as smart a reader and " user " of men as Mr Seddon, and that is not saying a little. A younger brother, who manages the Melbourne tramways, explains that it was Gordon Sprigg who offered, on behalf of Cape Colony, to contribute the cost of a British warship. Schreiner, whose " double game " has been notorious, has often been credited with this, but erroneously.

The whereabouts of Trooper " Sandy" Peddie has at last been ascertained. He has left Brabant's Horse and is now a member of the Pretoria Mounted Police. " Sandy's" father was in Wellington last week, and was delighted on hearing news ' of his son. Young " Sandy" learned his trade as engineer in Cable's foundry, and was, for a time, prominent in rowing circles here. » # # It transpires that one reason for Mr Jellicoe's visit to England is his desire to be present when the Privy Council hears the appeal against his three months' suspension by the Wellington Supreme Court. Mr Jellicoe will be well represented by counsel, as he has briefed Sir Robert Reid, formerly Attorney - General, Mr Lawson, Q.C., and Mr Hollams. # # • This Little Life. [Dedicated to all of us who have laughed at the Humour of Monotony.] We've shuffled over the Tracks of Time, We've laughed, we've loved, and we've cried ; Those who are cursed of the Gods have lived — Those whom They loved have died. Each has day, and each has way, As ye sow be sure ye shall reap. The Sun descends, and the Light drops down, And the gift of the Gods is sleep. Wellington, 1900. J. Barr. # # m The once despised Poverty Bay district ■ is going ahead with " leaps and bounds," and if the wool and meat export continues to boom as at present, even Hawko's Bay will have to look to its laurels. What Gisborne wants, however, is> land communication with a big centre, and she is now asking the Government to subsidise a stock road to Rotorua. The railway inland ought some day, to connect with Eotorua, but the "some day " is a long way off. A district that can double its number of sheep in ten years is worth helping, and the Hon. James Carroll, who had such a tremendous majority last election, should wake up when the interests of his constituents are concerned.

New Zealand is no doubt very prosperous just now, but it is a mistake to assume, as so many of our public men do assume, that such a thing' as a turn of the tide is impossible. What with one scheme and another the Government, backed up, it is true, by the House, is involving us in very greatly increased liabilities, and in municipal politics all over New Zealand the same spirit of extravagance is noticeable. Any sudden drop in the values of produce might give us a very nasty knock, and the worst of bad times is that they generally arrive when they are least expected. When General Booth was first in Melbourne he said, " You are all very proud of your fine city and your advantages over the old land. Wait a bit. Your chimney may smoke too." And, sure enough, it did very soon after. It would be just as well if New Zealand went slow for a while. If the- China row continues, money must get tighter and tighter, and tension in London is felt here. » • w The "Triad" society is now taking a hand in the Chinese game. If one went by the titles given to its branches — such as " Chamber of High Justice," " Society of Righteous Brethren," " Hall of Realised Repose" — one might imagine the "Triads" a combination of Freemasons and Oddfellows, with a slight dash of V.M.C.A., but, as a matter of fact, it is an association of murderers, pirates, and law-breakers generally. The secret signs are sure to include the twist of a pig-tail and the peculiar fingering of a tea cup. Of course, the society has its own particular slang. Murder is politely called "washing the body," a rifle is a " big dog," a revolver " a puppy," and powder and lead as " dog food." Like the Clan-na-Gael, the "Triad" has its agents all over the country. If a man incurs its enmity at Pekin and bolts, say, to Shanghai he finds " Triad" emissaries ready to deal with him. Even in 'Frisco the " Triad" has its agents, and a Wellington Chinaman whom the present writer asked for information on 4he subject was palpably afraid to say anything.