FROM THE WATCH TOWER

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 43, 13 May 1927, Page 8

FROM THE WATCH TOWER

By the LOOK-OUT MAN GOVERNMENT RICH IN IDEA 3 You can get your gramophone, your piano and your spring-mattress on deferred payments—which system has been coming in for a deal of abuse of late. Our enlightened Government, however, propose to go one better and get their State teachers on the instalment plan. The proposal is to train the teacher —and deduct the cost from his wages when he begins to work! "BY A XY OTHER XAME ” If the intention of the Government in prosecuting “punters” is, as has been suggested, for the purpose of obtaining revenue rather than to punish those dreadful malefactors, then it seems likely that it will kiil the goose that lays the golden egg, for a mes-

sage from THE SUN’S Christchurch correspondent to-day says that the business of the “bookies” is showing a fearful falling-off. The joke of it, though is that in regard to prosecutions the police are hindered in their hunt for unlawful bettors because most of the offenders use assumed names. One heavy “punter.” for instance, bets in the name of a high dignitary of the Anglican Church! One shudders to think of what might happen if a summons accusing him of unlawful gambling was served upon this venerable and venerated ecclesiastic.

MILK AND WATER The Look-out Man trusts no reader will accuse him of writing on current questions which demand vigorous handling, but on this occasion he is writing on milk and water, prompted by the reflection that although he is an early riser and walks about a bit, he has never, during six years in this country, seen what in other countries is a common sight—an inspector taking samples of milk from vendors. The other day a vendor in England was fined £2O (he ought to have been gaoled) for serving milk containing 50 per cent, of water to a mental hospital. This was too big a risk to take, even with lunatics. It is interesting to note that while Americans consume 54 gallons and Sweden 68 gallons, England uses 0n1y.20 gallons of milk a head of population annually—and medical men are so distrustful of the local supply that they advise mothers to use dried milk from abroad. In a recent analysis, 42 per cent, of milk‘samples secured in Yorkshire were found to contain liquid manure. England is the country which has more rickety children than any other country on earth. No wonder! But to return to our New Zealand—do the authorities here examine the milk? If so, how often? GOLD FI3II “Reading your remarks on the price of fruit,” writes a correspondent, who goes on to refer to those who retail the; food that is supposed to be beneficial to the brain, to wit, fish, in terms too emphatic for print. Yet one must sympathise somewhat with him. ’Tis a fishy business when one finds that he has to pay three-fold for his Friday’s feast what is paid the fisherman who catches it, and reads the while that one may buy fish manure at £ 6 10s a ton. “Rumour hath it,” as the late estimable Mr. Pepys would have said, that some of this manure is perfectly gentlemanly schnapper, withheld- from the market so that supplies may be kept down and prices kept up. This reminds on ( e of the fact that there are bitter complaints regarding the price of fish in England, where the cost of your digestible phosphates has gone up 127 per cent, since the days before the war, whereas the fisherman gets only 50 per cent, more for his catch. The consumer wants to know where the other 77 per cent, goes to. English fish-eaters have been paying a shilling a pair for kippers, and Sir Wilfred Sugden, M.P., points out that this yields a profit of 4,000 per cent. Auckland’s fish merchants are content with a fair thing, however. They would not consider it honest to make more than 400 per cent. * * * THE LITTLE OLD MAX —

“The presence of this lively little old man in a kilt guaranteed the success of any concert,” says a Scots paper in an obituary notice of James Scott Skinner, the “Strathspey King.” Skinner at a very early age demonstrated that he had the spirit of the dance in him. Full recognition of his talents was not accorded him, however, until middle life. To-day it is admitted that, in his own line, he has contributed more to the minstrelry of Scotland than any musician since Niel Gow. Skinner’s collections of Highland dance music are known by Scots the world over, and his own compositions, “The Miller o’ Ham” strathspey and 'Bonnie Lass o’ Bon-Accord,” have set many a heel a-tapping.