A RECORD CRUSH.

Shannon News, 29 October 1924, Page 4

A RECORD CRUSH.

TURNSTILES INADEQUATE. CONGESTION AT RICCARTON. BACKERS LOUD LAMENTATIONS. The thousands of folk who set out to woo Dame Fortune at the Riccarton racecourse the othgr day all seemed to arrive at the inside enclosure gates at the same time. Either that or else the new set of four tilrnstiles which has been installed is hopelessly inadequate—most ,people thought that the congestion was due to the latter cause. J ust before the first race began, some million dollar mob scene might have been staged at both the inside enclosure gates to the course and at the motor entrance. Even old patrons of the club remarked sarcastically at the delay; at one time the congestion looked rather grave.

Long- queues of ticket-holders stood on one foot and then on the other (or somebody else’s), and wondered when on iearth they would get inside the grounds to breathe again without the fear of being stilled. But the queues were s.iow to move—very slow. . The time for the first race crept on, and still hundreds were doing their best not to show their impatience, at least not to make it too obvious. Some really nasty things were said about the club —really nasty things. Unfortunately, the comment to those who did not get in to see the first race .(and they were many and bitter) will never be published. No one knows the heart-burning, the 1 anguish of the wearers of the crushed frocks. '

“Look at it! Just look at it! Ruined!” almost sobbed a sveldt dame who got squeezed between the back and the front of two jovial farmers. “??• —-!!??” muttered a slim figure in oriental trimmings as her paradise plumes got tangled in the spectacles of a Harold Lloyd imitation. Still the crowds surged and eddied and eddied and surged while perspiring gatekeepers drafted the racegoers into the enclosure. They did their best, working like Trojans. Still it couldn’t be helped, and by the time the second race was due the eager folk were all inside to flutter round the tote if they wanted to. Those who said the most, and the worst, were those who could not get in to back the sure things in the first race. The followers of the first and second horses were many—if these persons had had their way, the poor gee-gees would not have paid 5/-.

clieus made haste and came down; so wi11,1,” and he at once resumed his seat. “Go on,” shouted his fellow students, “go on.” “No, said Spurgeon, “he could not improve on that if he tried ever so much.”-

Those who remember Bishop Field Flowers Goe during his term of office in Melbourne would never include him in a company of Wits, but his peculiar name brought him some notoriety. At the church congress at Wakefield the then Bishop of Ripon, ,in introducing him as the new Bishop of Melbourne, punned on his name. When the future Bishop was an undergraduate at Magdalen Hall, Oxford, a joke was made at his expense, and told on his failing to pass his “Little Go.” It ran as follows: The Field was ploughed, the Flowers were plucked, and it was no Little Go.’ A variant of the story is that the examiner said: “Sir, for your first name you are ploughed, for your second you are plucked, and as for your third name, there is the door.” Dean of the Chapel Royal, Dublin, having received a command to attend a Royal Commission in London, obeyed, and on arrival at Westminster, was considerately asked by an'lrish peer sort of a voyage he had experienced. “Don’t mention it,” he replied, “for it was so bad that it almost caused me to thrfiw up the Royal Commission.” Cardinal Manning was seated by the Chief Rabbi at a dinner on one occasion. A delicious slice of ham was brought to the Cardinal, and, turning to the Rabbi, he said: “Ah, to think you must not eat of this.” “Oh,” replied tjie Rabbi,, ‘I will undertake to eat it at your Eminence’s wedding.” A famous wit was Father Healey, who, on going to dine with Judge Keogh, one day,* met the judge’s favourite daughter in a'u avenue on a donkey, which was being led by her cousin. "Why is he led?” asked Father Healey, “Lest he should run away with me,” the lovely girl said. “He’d be no ass to run away with you, Jessie,” the witty priest replied. Another day Father Healey met two young ladies, one of whom became Countess of Wicklow, ascending a hill on foot, add making fruitless efforts to urge on a relucta/it ass,, harnessed to a miniature phaeton. They accosted Father Healey in their distress, saying, “Oh, Father Healey, we’re so glad to meet you. What shall we do to make this beast proceed?” “Go before him," he said, “and he’s a greater donkey than I take him to be if he do not follow.”

Bishop Bloomfield, of London, used ! to tell a story of his having been once late in life at the University Church, at Cambridge, and having seen a verger there, whom he remembered when he himself was an undergraduate. The Bishop said to the verger that he was glad he was looking so well at such a great age. “Oh, yes,, my lord,” said the verger, ‘‘l have much to be thankful for. I have heard every sermon that has beefi preached in this church for fifty years, and thank God, I am a Christian still.” Whitefield once said during a service: "We will now sing a hymn, to he followed by a collection. It will give those a chance who do not choose to give their mite to sneak off.” Not one moved. —Melbourne "Age.”