Afternoon Tea Gossip

Free Lance, Volume IV, Issue 169, 26 September 1903, Page 6

Afternoon Tea Gossip

By Little Miss Muffitt.

A Melbourne judge's advice to a divorced wife is peculiarly a propos locally at the present time "Avoid the co-respondent as you would the plague." * * * The curse of prohibition. An Ashburton storekeeper says that his cash takings during August, 1903, exceeded by £150 those of the previous year. Poor publicans' * * Juries are underpaid — or nearly always. However, one Southern coioner's juryman, the other day. had a stroke of luck. Being o<n the spot, they gave him the "subject" to bury. * * * Unlucky thirteen ' King the man charged with burglary, was tripped up over his thirteenth little expedition. He must have passed under a ladder, or broken a looking-glass, or something. * » • I believe that Napier is the only town in New Zealand which has a professional mus'c tea char wisi a tatle. Lady Compbell (formerly Miss Isabella Carandini) undertakes those duties in the Hawke's Bay hub. * * * Lines found scribbled on the Avail at the Wellington Meat Export, works ■ — Mary had a little ewe, So nlayful and so callow , But when the heat reached 92, It turned to mutton tallow. * -c * The Right Hon. Geo. Reid, the dramatic New South Wales politician, who discarded his monocle after many years of affectionate attachment, is considered to be the greatest navigator in Australia. He crosses the Lyne almost every day. * *• * The only business done the other day in the court of egiogious Eketahuna, which recently deprecated the fact that its climate was becoming as abominable as that of Wellington, was 'Silence'" from the constable The Court then rose. * * * The Rev. J. Campbell, of Papanui, surely cannot subscribe to Biblical notions. He recently show ed a lan torn slide of a piece of rata, w Inch he explained had grown m New Zealand 300,000 years ago Moses was born about 294,000 years Ir.ler. * * * Another shooting fatality. Constables reporters, and human bemgs heard the shot in a Christ chui eh street, and ecathered round to prevent the fiend escaping. They could not do it The sun had got to work on a bicycle tyre. It exploded. No arrests have been made. * # * So original. A Balcairn genius has invented a fire alarm which does away with the possibility of false alarms. When the alarmist breaks the glass (with his hand!), the alarm grabs him, and holds him until the police come. As the average man breaks the alarm with a rook or a stick, the beauty of the arrangement does not strike me. "Dachter Tarrey," from dallar land, and Mr. Alexander, the singing evangelist, were, according to an American paper, recently leturned to Chioawgo, where they were received by 6000 people, "who sang hymns in loud unison, and showed the depth of their feeling by faces suffused with religious fervour." * * * One sees some illuminating advertisements i& papers. Some of them show pretty plainly which way the wind is blowing, and who is going to wear the* — or— bifurcations in the future. "Agnes" advertises in a Sydney paper offering to exchange a pet canary for a pair of trouser stretchers. Australian women recently got the suffrage. * * * The late Captain Staughton, the youthful M.L.A. of Victoria, who won the seat his father had previous^ held, was a rich man. His esiate contributed £10,836 4s 2d to the Victorian revenue last week in the shape of probate duty. The clever young man went to Africa as a oontingenter, winning a commission and a D.C.M.. He was a great favourite politically and socially.

A young man in Melbourne offeis to build a city tour tunes the size of Ballarat (-50,000), and wJI take on 10,000 woikmon at once. He tells the Government he will start m at onoe n they give him £100. The Government have not rusihed this broad path to wealth up to now. * * * A propos of the favourite pastime of stonewalling, Mr. Jackson. M.L.A., of Queensland recently remarked it v. as as old as the lulls. Plutarch relates how, on one occasion "Cat© stood up in the Senate and spoke all day in order to block a motion going through providing for a triumph to Julius Cjesai on his letura from Gaul." * * * A local man tells me his wife is called Elizabeth. I wanted to know why he called her Peggy. Short for Pegasa, he said, and further explained that Pegasa was feminine for Pegasus. I didn't comprehend, of course, until he explained that Pegasus was an immortal steed. Then, of course, I knew that she was an everlasting nag. * * * Everybody knows "Dooley" Dunne, the American, cynic and humorist. From the backwater of prairie journalism he has pushed his way to eminence at the point of Irish vernacular. "Eddie" Geaoh is going to bring the philosopher to Australia, on s lecturing tour, and he is bound to let some Hibernian droppings fall on us. * * * •'Trust" butchers arc evidently not going to get all their own way. An, anta-sixpencoper-pound syndicate has been formed down South, which pledges itself not to touch, taste, or handle tho expensive meat. It gives the butchers a suggestive reminder by recommending that in future the pound used be sixteen ounces avoirdupois, and not twelve ounces troy. I wish them every sfuocess. Hooray ! * * * The Rev. Sarginson, of Christchurch, hits a nail on the head — "The State that hires its lads out to be drudges to starveling farmers, or its girls to those wishing to obtain cheap drudges, has not risen to the full height of its responsibilities." Certainly there is an Oliver Twist flavour about some modern methods. although, of comse, the "starveling" farmers of New Zealand are chock full of the viitues. * * * A propos of the loquacity which our Premier deprecates, the Common wealth Senate seems to suffer from the complaint, too. Melbourne "Punch" says "Chin music has been far too much m evidence lately. Members of either House seem to be vicing with one another as to who shall talk longest and say least. The Senate is sinking into insignificance solely for tlus leason. Its debates are too utterly wearisome, too pointless for publication." Sara Bemhardt, tne great actress, keeps her coffin at the foot of her bed, and, of course, there is always the "et cobra, and the baby alligator. The coffin is of pearl wood, and S.B. and the motto, "Ouand-meme," is the only inciiption. The inside is most comfortable, lined with white satin, and there are cushions and mattresaes and a bolster. Faded bouquets and love letters form the lining. Madame's coffin must be a huge affair * * * I notice that a ''snowball letter," a flake of which struck me two-and-a-half years ago, is still in circulation. It pui ports to have for its object the collection of 100,000 stamps to provide for a children's w ard in a Sydney suburb that doesn't exist. Auckland "Observer" said some very trenchant things about this idiotic contrivance to run the postal authorities off their leprs, and the same things are true now . It is your duty to break the chain if a link comes your way * * * The foreign band — I don't know v. hethor 1 it is German or Austnan — w ais playing outside a city office on Saturday. Into that office came a smart-looking man in blue uniform and a cheesecutter cap. The lady clerk queried "Band?" at the same time thrusting a shilling into the hand of the man in uniform. Tho man let out a bovine roar. He was a ship's engineer, who had come in to do business. The only thing that's hurt him is being "mistaken for a bally Dutchman with a name beginning with Mac." * * * An officer of the Sierra, who knows a thing or two about fish, caught a couple of the flvmg variety lately and told the steward to put them in spirits to preserve them, intending to send them to the museum of his old college. The fish were cooked by accident, and eaten. The steward got a couple of mackerel, fitted them with tin "wings," put them in spirits of wine, and delivered them to his "boss." That officer recently handed in the fish to tl*e professors of the college. They agree that the fish are quite unique specimens.

Tiagedy from. Newtown. No hotels. Must keep a barrel. Used to supner beer all his life. Consequently, he got m a four-srallon keg ,and felt good. Good beer, too. Wife congratulated him. Thinks he will have another. Goes to the pantry with the jug. The last half-pint \vas just gentlj trickling from the spigot. His wife, in her hurry, had left the tap on. Seems a bit rough that, in the, country where the women of the backblocks have to slaive pretty hard, that big, able-bodied swaggers should be increasing as a class. The same ablebodied drones practically demand assistance from these w omen. I note that one of the class, who found a woman alone m an out of the way farmhouse recently, made no bones about attempting to collect portable property. The lady held him off with a stick of firewood. Lots of heroines do not get medals. *■ * #■ Here is a country correspondent's paragraph, exhibiting that sense of humour without which no correspondent is complete. He didn't intend it however —"A boat was seen floating down the Waitara river to-day, being carried out to sea by the flood caused by the late rains. The bo«at is supposed to be that of the oil vessel "Kotaki" , if so. it will bei a loss to Mr. Williamson the owner, who is at present lying at the New Plymouth braekwater. having gone there for shelter during the bad weather."