AFTERNOON TEA GOSSIP

Free Lance, Volume III, Issue 156, 27 June 1903, Page 6

AFTERNOON TEA GOSSIP

By Little Miss Muffitt.

Giving evidence at an inquest the other day, a well-known medico artlessly said —"I pi escribed for him on Wednesday, and he died on the following night." Cause and effect, eh ? Miss Mabel Baker, of Thames is I believe the first lady ,daily reporter in New Zealand. Anvhovr, she applied tor a junior reportership on the Thames ' Star," and got it There is no doubt modern girls are more courageous than their mothers. Mr. Ell, M H R,., of State Bank fame, is rather clever at finance. Last week he declared at Sydnehain that "a penny and threepence is what they charge in Liverpool for their free concerts " Mr. Ell also advocated free thieepennv concerts in the colony as an antidote to sixpenny ''beers." • * * How- is it that other people don't see e y e to eye with New Zealand in the great temperance cause ? "Table Talk" says — "Judkins is the name of the new local-option, anti-barmaid, and temperance anostle who has been imported from Maoriland to save Australia." One would think that Mr. Judkins was not welcome. • * • Mr. George Lynch is the latest addation to those who have written a book about the ' Boer-Bntish war." He is struck with the aptitude of the British Tommy for real jagged, lund, scathing cursing on every occasion. He describes Tomm-'s language as "A Bandolier of Blasphemy." • * • The ingenuousness of the average Wellington voun^ter is proverbial One little gnhe, of five, whose father is b-f no means an Adonis, recently took a hand-glass and admired her pretty little face in it. "Did God make me, Mum ? " she asked. Her mother said that he did "Did he make Pa^a, too ? " pursued the little maid 'Yes, dear." 'He seems to be dome; better work latel- doesn't he, Mum?" • * * The other day, w-hile dallying with some old school books in use forty years ago, I came across a little thing written in a schoolboy hand. The boy — who is now a well-known Jewish citizen, of Wellington — remarked therein "Rich men eat venison because it is dear but I eat mutton because it is sheap." His name is down on that subscription-list for the Kishiiieff Jewish massacre relief fund for a big sumhow ever. • * ♦ It is interesting to learn, on the authority of a society person, that kissing between women is not "smart" now. The c-nly women who kiss each other now-a-days are members of obscure little bethels and women who perform the perfunctory peck because their grandmothers used to. This writer, however says that all that the society w oman is expected to do nowadays is to rub hate with her friend. One of our doctors has been so busy lately that he has had to engage a youth hot from school to answer the bell. Durinr his second day of office, one of the boy's acquaintances called. The doctor was busy, and had little time to snare for each patient. So the boy told him. The boy asked his friend if he had brought his symptoms along, "as them was the first thines he always asked for." The man said he hadn't, and was told to slip out and get them. Seems that he went home, inquired for them, and was duly fitted with them by his daughter, who is in the sixth standard. • * The Melbourne University Commission, w hich recently sat, found out some things. It found out, on the evidence of a Master of Arts, who was a gifted mathematician, and had carried off all the prizes in his final year, that he had to give up teaching "because he was not receiving the wages of a mechanic." I know men in New Zealand who could not earn a mechanic's wages bv any skill they possess, and who could not pass a sixth standard examination, and vet whose salary runs into four figures. One doesn't want to be an M.A. to get on. A friend at court is a better asset than a degree.

Newest tiling in rabbit-poisoning devices is to paint wire fences with a> poisonous compound the stench of which will strike a rabbit dead at twenty yards. How would you like to be a sheep or a boundary-rider on a station where this sjstem was in operaA Northern paper weeps a couple of inches, saying that, although the shooting season is well on, nobody has sent the editor any game, and he is fond of it. I believe that the editor of that paper is a clergyman, which, of couise, accounts for his expeitness in the art of asking. * *■ • A fellow confined m tliQ gaol Once turned exceeding paol What is it B " they cried And the fellow replied ); I thought I had swallowed a whaol * • • A prop os of the school of journalism I often advocate How wuld the writer of the following fit a vacancy on the staff ? ■ — ' Sunday last was extremely wet and stormy affecting the attendance at the local churches, where, however, the services were in accordance with the occasion." "Wet and stormy service" is good. ' Populair Mechanics," a truthful little publication that didn't chop a cherrytree down, says that the secret of makine typewriter ribbons has been handed down from father to son for a century. I'll ask the New Century typewriter what kind of a machine it had on the market in 1803. Mr. Willis could not tell a lie, and he w ouldn't if he oould. * * * The Ashburton lad, who "condignly reacted" a billet under the Education Board recently, has an anti-type in the youth who immediately grabbed the opportunity left vacant, and wrote telling the Board that he had a sixth standard certificate and could sing, and would they please give him a billet. The billet is to be provided "for his pluck." ■* * * There is a sudden epidemic of police morality m New York. They raided a ladies' progressive euchre party recently. The proceeds were to be "devoted to charity." The chief police officer said "Euchre parties are really poker "ames in sheep's clothing." Now, supDOse Wellington policemen got to work on euchre parties, high-toned clubs, and the like. They would have no time to look for boy burglars, even. * * * Mr. Hogg, Minister of L 1 mean member for Masterton, recently explained why the gaols were fuller in, the wmter time. It was more comfortable being in gaol than on a little selection m the roadless, bndgeless back-country. Evidently, it would be kinder of the Government to say to the young man, "Go to gaol," than to invite him to 'Go on the land." * * * I know a man who felt cold last week He would get a pair of nice warm gloves for a start He saw the very things he required in a Quay shop-window He went in. 'I'll take those gloves," he said, feeling for two half-row ns wherewith to pay the bill. The man behind the counter smiled but wrapped them up. "How much?" queued the buyer, who is an intelligent clerk, or something like that "Fifteen guineas please " replied the counter man, with never a smile. But my friend isn't taking any real sealskin gloves after all. * * * Many of the "guides" who volunteered for British service during the war in Africa w ere Dutch patriots, who led Britons into traps. There was, therefore, a suspicion that Clements, the guide of the First Victorian Contingent, was not exacth 7 the clean potato, as he was half Dutch. So suspicious were the "gumsuckers" that they put a man behind him ready to ventilate him should he show any disposition to "reneg." The suspect, however, did such good British work that he is now the cnh Boer wearing the V.C. Some of those Somali Contingent Boeis, howe\ei will probably eet their "fourpenn'orth of coin-metal." Who does not worship at the sin me of Mane Corelh? Every line bieathes Mane and every word speaks of Coielli. Marie was recently asked to write something for "Baconia," a publication w hich is! endeavouring to pro\ c that "Shakespeare" was wntten by Bacon. The mild Mane wrote to the editor — "I would as soon subscnbeto a magazine written by lunatics and published at Colney Hatch, as to >our 'Bacoma' (sic), which is produced evidently merely to gratify the intermeddling pedantry of small modern scribblers who in their utter inability to do anything notable themselves, take up the scandalous business of robbing the w orld's greatest genius of his name and reputation."