ENTRE NOUS

Free Lance, Volume III, Issue 152, 30 May 1903, Page 14

ENTRE NOUS

MISS Kate Wriggleswortli ("Kate Gair") at present of the Ma, jeroni Dramatic Company, is so uell known to Welkngtonians that quite a numbei of people who have seen this talented and comely actress play will be surprised to hear that she is an Australian by birth. However, she has lived in Wellington nearly the whole of her life, and it was here that she laid the foundation of her stage career. Curiously, Miss Wriggles worth did not graduate from the ranks of the dramatic amateurs, for v. hen she joined Haw trey's Company, two years ago, she had' never played for either amateur or professional companies, • * * However, her ability as a reciter, coupled w ith the w inning charm of her manner, ied both Mr. Haw trey and Mr. Chas. Arnold to point out that although the dramatic path was pncklv, there were compensations for people with talent. Miss Wn^qleeworth has played in musical comedy, and her dramatic repertoire is. a very extensive one. An abiding sense of humour has prevented Miss Wrig^lesworth from becoming: down-hearted for as both these eminent actors pointed out, it is quite true that the novice's path s thickly strewn with thorns She regards the makeshifts of small back-country touring companies as ''funny," and even found something 10 laugh at in having to live and sleep and ha."c her being in a thick ulster and big boots while touring the wet West Coast — an experience she regards a® the most trying within her short professional career. Miss Wriggleswo-rth's favourite character is that of Mercia. in "The Sign of the Cross," although she places her Lady Isabel in "East Lynne," amongst her best things. "Biddy," m "Harbour Lights " is also a favourite. • • • Miss Wrigglesworth is intensely nervous. Her fellow-pl ayers smile w hen she says so, but she still holds that she is liable at any moment to forget her lines but she alw ays manages to pull through without the audience noticing any defects. Interesting to note that when she joined the Majoroni Company in Wellington she was quite unacquainted w ith any of the parts she is olavinp She owns to beinc "very strong " and regards the life as a heaHhv one TJltimatelv, she will gro to Kneland although her moclestv makes her say "he is yet too inexperienced to bravp the opinion of the Great British Public

The Wellington newspapers got back on the Trades Councillor very neatly last week The leading members of the Council at the pievious meeting had expended vituperations upon "the reptile press," and had gone out of their nay'to insult the pressmen who had regularly reported the proceedings of tJie Council for nearly twelve months. Last week the "Times" and "Post" decided that they would not in future report the Council's meetings — and on Thursday nieht the Council solemnly resolved to exclude a press which was not seeking admission ' * ♦ • In one of the mining towns not a hundred miles from Auckland there i« a medical man whose friends are gravely anxious as to his condition. Enlargement of the heart threatens to be his doom The other day he desired to engage a. "tiger" to set off his buggy, and in off hours make himself generally useful as groom and rouseabout. One of the applicants was offered by the medico the ruinous salary of 5s a week, "and keep himself." He decided to out out for the gumfields instead, and the ornamental billet is still vacant. * # • People who don't get their living by selling meat are becoming annoyed because the sheep sent to Africa from New Zealand are "scrags." They say it is injudicious to send such stuff to a country with which we want to establish a trade. It is 1 not nice, of course, to send scrags," but why send sheep to Africa at all ? London itself could eat up every scrap 'of mutton we could send it for the next fifty years, and, seeing that if we got markets all oa ci the world we couldn't supply them, what's the good of talkine about "findins: outlets 9 " If the one and only industry of New Zealand was sheep freezing and export'ne. London which wants about a million carcases a day, could keep us all working supplying it. To talk as if the world was waiting for its dinner until we could send it its chop is too absurd. Heie is a duck-shooting tale from the gummy North Some jocularly-dis-posed individual had a bit of fun at the expense of a new-chum sportsman this week. They were duck-shooting. A duck was shot the previous evening, skinned, and stuffed with old rags, etc., and planted on the 1 edge of a stream. After Mr. New -chum blazed aiway twenty cartridges at the already dead one he at last cautiously approached the bird, made a grab at it, and brought it to his residence. On cleaning the bird, it was discovered to contain the contents of a laundry. * « * Wluch reminds us that in another parti of this well-feathered country last week, in, the dusk of the twilight, a settler knocked over six ducks with his two bariels, put them in a sack, and took them to his wife in triumph. She opened the bas with a smile, and dropped it with a erhastlv veil The 1 birds w ere her prize Avlesburvs which ha"tl wandered aw ny from home to a neighbouring creek

The flimsiest excuses sometimes hoodwink a country bench of Justices. Onei of them, had before it last week a settler summoned for keeping his son from school. The father explained that he had a vicious horse which only he or the boy could drive, and public safety required that the youngster should have charge of it when he had to be absent. And this transparent plea was accepted as ample justification for breaking into the youngster's school work.

Trains are run in New Zealand for tlhe convenience of the public. Someone always grumbles, hiweveir. A man who recently travelled in a train says the sole occupants were two stock inspectors, one member of Parliament, one road overseer, two State schoolteachers, a railway official, and ai reporter. The whole lot were pfaotiicaUy "dead-heads," with the exception, of himself. And he is merely annoyed because he hadn't the privilege of being a "dead-head" too.

A band of brave hearts at Milton recently resolved to do or die for a scared community. A ghost haunted the vicinity, and if they couldn't lay it they'd die m the attempt. Reconnoitring carefully, the spook was eventually surrounded, and at a given signal a fusillade of stones and other weapons of annihilation, was poured in upon "it." No "material" ghost could have withstood this onslaught for more than one volley , but this one gave no indication, either by word or sign, of hurt or desire to vanish into thin air. The feeling of awe thereby occasioned gradually ga.vei place to one of confidence, so, after a further fusillade, led on by a firearm, the body of heroes advanced to meet the . There, revealed by the pale moon, in the first process of curing, hung a* mighty swine, clothed in a winding sheet of spotless white. • • • A certain sportsman, who meant to take time' by the forelock at the opening of the duck-shooting season, found himself outdone by the greater smartness of a poaching small boy. For years past, this shootist has used as decoys two live Paradise ducks, w*hioh he had trained to the work, and on the evening before the season opened he Jet loose his lures on the pond where* he meant to shoot when the proper time came. Then came along the youthful punter, who "potted" the birds, and boiethem off m triumph. The wrathful decoy-ov\ ncr overtook the culprit, and threatened him with the painsi and penalties of the law for shooting out of season But he finds now that these threats amount only to blank cartridge. Seeing that the birds have been tame foi ten years, they do not come under the category of game, and the acclimatisation people refuse to prosecute. He must grin and bear his loss. • » • Touching the narrow escapes from shell nic recently experienced in Wellington thiough people putting not quite ' dead" shell cases in proximity to fire grates, it does not speak well for the quality of the shells, does it? Still, burning shells is a common enough pastime During the late war _ tons of captured shells were placed in heaps, surrounded with firewood, and ignited. Fatigrue parties had no particular instructions to "stand clear," and no damage ever resulted to anyone. As ■ for common every-day rifle cartridges, they werei piled in hundreds of thousands and popped off harmlessly. Both shells and cartridges seem to lose their capacity foa harm when not assisted ry a rifled barrel.

The nobility of England, in, the olden times, had no sympathy with drinking between meals. The little they took was always consumed with a small quantity of food. Somebody has been looking up the household accounts of the great Percy family, which flourished, in the sixteenth century. For the guidance of temperate folk it may be mentioned that at breakfast, which was served at seven w> the morning, the earl and countess had a quart of beer and a quart of wine between them ; two sons, "My Lorde Percy and Mais Iteir Percy," a pottle (two quarts) of beer and two children in the "Nurcy" (nursery) a quart of beer. • * • For dinner, at ten o'clock, my lord and lady had a gallon of beer and a Tx>ttle of wine, the two boys a quart of beer, and the younger children! a pottle of beer. At supper, at four o'clock, the earl and countess shared a pottle of beer and a pottJe of wine 1 ; tihe ohiMren also had their allowance. For "livery," which was served in the bedroom, between eight and nine 1 in the evening, the Darents were supplied with a gallon of beer and a quart of wine, and each pair of children) with a pottle of beer. Dear little prattling babes! • # • There was a good deal of comment occasioned by the fact that several prohibitionists attended a banquet recently given to the Premier on the goldfields. A "total abstainer" got to work in the paper, and "while deprecating the presence of gentlemen of such pronounced prohibition views, hoped that their abstemious example would be a good one to the Premier." As a matter of ecxld hard, solid fact, the Premier is one of the. most temperate men m New Zealand. No character is sacred, however, to some intemperate water-wagtails. • • • Wellington landlords are able f o pick and choose their tenants. One intending tenant, who was first in the field having decided to "go in" before the paint was dry, paid a week's rent in advance, and began to move furniture from the house he had occupied. Someone had bought the house, you see, and he had. to clear out. In the meantime, the new landlord, hearing that he had three children, called' on him and gave him. a week's notice, as he "didn't build houses for kids to Icnock about." The ex-tenant has stored his furniture, and gone into lodgings, until someone dies, or until the City Council buy some land and put up a couple of thousand cottages.

"Train up a child," etc. A propos, a suburban youngster last week was detected in the act of passing a cigarette under the form to his fellow class-mate at school. The teacher stood him forth and "supposed he'd been stealing lus father's cigarettes " The youngster naively replied that ' mother lett her cigarette case on the mantelpiece, and these is them." Only last Sunday We roticed a w ell-known Wellington Society woman puffing the pernicious cvlind'er of shavings while taking the aav in a motor-car on the Miramar-road. • • • The latest design in bedsteads has an alarm clock built into the rail. 't would be a pietty poor kind ot an awakener, however, for some people. For instance, during the Cootamundra (New South Wales) fireball visitation the roof of an hotel was staved in. One bed was filled up with such a weight of bricks that the legs bent. Another bed occupied by a fairly sound sleeper, was alongside. They had ereat dimculty m waking this man, who eventually turned round, and asked, "Why the deuce can't yer co to sleeo a growlin like that '" * * * ' Cyclops" has been summing up Invercargiil. Here is the result.— "If one visited it, say, to-day, and again five years hence, he would notice the .same old new premises *n Dee-street. He would observe the same old unemployed veteran, still sleek and fat, still propping up the same old verandah post, and still stifling the same old yawn. He would note the same old dog snapping at the same old butcher's horse. Unchangeable and unchanging, InvercargUl pursues the even tenor of a plump, well-satisnerl existence. Sometimes it awakes with a start., and wonders, in its own. fat war, if it heard something drop. Then, it punches its pillow, and relapses into a fresh round of somnolence., hoping that the milkman will put the billy lid on tight before he goes away." Of course Sir Joseph Ward can't be at home ill the time. # The little up-country town that has recently been, modernised bv having gas laid on, liked it until the bills came in. Still, the citizens cheerfully paid up. One man, who came to Wellington on a holiday, tells us> a yarn. He said that during the fortnight he was in the city he closed up his house Seems he is a sporting man, and he made a bet before coming away. When he got baok he went to the gas office, to pay lus account. It was only half the sum he had paid during the previous month. He scratched his head, and looked glum. Said it wasn't what he expected, and was much annoyed with the clerk. The clerk protested the charge was 1 right, and the man reluctantly paid up. He had made a bet of £5 that the bill for half a month would be as big as usual, and meeting honectv he didn't expect, he felt hurt

The tragic death of Shrewsbury, the cricketer, lecalls the passing of another gieat name in the field of sport. Fred. Archer, England's most famous jockey, shot himself while his wife was in the same room. "Just see who that is, my dear." the great horseman said, as, Ivmg on a bed of sickness, he heard w heels outside His wife went to the window as desired, and during her moment ary absence, he seized a revolver secreted in a box near at hand — and z-ode no more. The end of the great cricketer is all the more sad seeing that the person nearest at hand was his betrothed. * • • Bishop Neligan, of Auckland, recently said he did not mind what political opinion a man favoured as long as he had clean hands and a pure heart. And every politician in New Zealand will exclaim with fervour, "That's me'"

The Hon. Hall-Jones was recently up North, and it is encouraging to note that he has survived the dangers of that boggy part of King Dick's dominions. Anyone who has braved! the perils of the Kaipara will appreciate' a story now being told about the Minister's visit. Between Wellsford and Kaiwaka the Ministerial party "tailed out," as the stockmen would say. Mr. A. E. Harding:. M.H.R., who had, of course, to diverge en route to kiss the babies and make himself generally pleasant to his constituents, came across an old Kaipara friend. "Is the Minister a long way ahead?" asked the M.H.R. "No" but I met the funeral. Where is the corpse ?" Mr. Hall-Jones as a mourner is a new line. * • • To those who require a soort that will stir the young blood, and give the fillip that only nersonal danger can supply, we would recommend the kind of deer-stalking indulged in by a middleaged and more than portly Wellingtonlan,. He, with a friend, has recently been up country after "heads'," and] for three days they tramped the country with empty bags. According to the veracious man with the full waistcoat, they had been plodding wearily all day, and were thinking of returning home, ■R hem up sprang a fine fat sleek deer. Of course, after a shot or two they wounded him, and the deer fell. * * * Then, they made a rush to knife him. The deer seemed to know the deadly weapon, made a struggle, and regained his feet. The anecdotast mounted him, and took a good grip of his horns, and the other cried out "stick to him," and away they went, both deer and man, for about half a mile down hill through scrub, fern, and brambles. When, the rider leaned back to get his knife, he found it had worked out of place, and il took him some considerable time to get it. Then, after a few minutes furious ride he managed to regain his grip, and then performed the wonderful feat of pithing the animal. When his mate arrived on the spot he (the rider) exclaimed "I knew I could stick to him." He shows that head with pr-dc and there is absolutely no connection between a recent auction sale of trophies of the field and this particular specimen. * * * After all, the whole colony does not look with a benevolent eye on the endeavours of record breakers. Even the plucky Captain Voss, of the Tihkum, gets "let. down" now and again. One scrib© remarks that "he is doing it for a wager, and he has a considerable distance to travel before he is entitled to the 'boodle.' Meantime, he is raking in as many sliekels as he can by dodging the salt water, and recounting to the unsophisticated of this credulous colony the thrilling narrative of his money-making voyage." As a matter of fact Captain Voss is circumnavigating the world solely to raise funds for the poor. Captain Yoss is not. rich, but he w ill be.

Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany is a constant but anonymous contributor o the newspapers. He is so fearful that the source of these 1 works of genius may leak out that he prohibits any- .mention of their authorship — except in leading articles. • • * A Wanganui farmer has been rising to remark that valuations made by Government valuators, who have been no nearer to the land than the nearest hotel, are not necessarily to be depended on. This is rough on the valuators. A propos of inspectors, we have in mind the case of a rural population in Australia which worried the Government to such an extent that ifc answered their prayer, and appointed a rabbit inspector to see that the provisions of the Rabbit Act were carried out. That inspector went to work at once, and got the framers of the petition fined £30 for not killing the pest! In fact, he issued a batch of summonses comprising as defendants every farmer in a district with 300 miles of frontage. Then he went away to the hotel, and had a "spree." Thereafter, when 1 he intended making a periodical raid, he wrote to the farmers, who in' the meantime "let the rabbits rip." and they all met him before he started work, and made it unnecessary for him to suend money on sprees himself. Thereafter, there were no summonses, although taie inspector holds his billet to this day. » • • The fact that a Maori entered an up-country newspaper office, and' paid 4 year's subscription! to the paper, is beincr used by some dozens of papers in New Zealand as a news paragraph. Please pass it on.