FROM THE WATCH TOWER

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 64, 7 June 1927, Page 8

FROM THE WATCH TOWER

By the LOOK-OUT MAN. GIVING IT BACK It seems that in some instances,the Customs takes with one hand and gives back with the other. There is, for example, a duty of 4s a 100 ft on imported wooden box-making timber, but this duty is refunded when the boxes or crates are filled with butter and cheese exported from the Dominion. This is a wonderful encouragement for the use of New Zealand timbers for butter-boxes and cheese crates. Also, it illustrates the wonderful workings of the Official Mind. % * * "ONCE AGAIN!” “Once Again!” writes the head-line-man over a news item, and you read on to learn that the Mayor of Auckland has gone to church, and “with him were IS councillors.” Some degree of surprise is registered in the “Once Again!” but you begin to understand when it is remembered that this was the third occasion since his election this term that the mayor had chosen to sit among the goodly. Perhaps it was in thanksgiving for liis election. But when he takes 18 councillors with him!—well, really, if this sort of thing keeps up, it is plain that the City Architect must be instructed to prepare plans for a private chapel to be attached to the Town Hall. IN THE LION'S MOUTH Dr. E. P. Neale, secretary of the Auckland Chamber of Commerce, seems to have placed his head in the lion’s mouth. Just when the Manufacturers’ Association is carrying on a campaign in support of New Zealandmade goods, the good doctor delivers a lecture to the W.E.A. in Which he expresses the opinion that New Zealand is not destined to become a great manufacturing country. Well, the same thing was. said about Australia, and is now proven to have been ridiculous, for Australia has made astonishing industrial* strides thanks largely to efficient protection. Just why New Zealand, with inexhaustible supplies of coal, and with the advantage of unlimited water-power (and equally efficient protection) cannot emulate her big sister, has not been set forth by Dr. Neale—or, at least, not in print. In the meantime, the Manufacturers’ Association, which is closely allied to the Chamber of Commerce, has intimated to Dr. Neale that it was “unwise” of him to base such statements purely upon theory. * * * A DRY AFFAIR We are told the King’s birthday celebration at Roto Roa was a “gay affair.” It must certainly have been a dry one, for to Roto Roa are sent those men who habitually drink more alcohol than society approves of. Some of them leave the island, after six or twelve months, without any desire to renew acquaintance with John Barleycorn—some rush back* to him with the delight of calves who have been temporarily separated from ; their mothers. One wonders what were the feelings of those sixty men as they thought of the rivers of liquor they had seen flow on former King’s birthdays, when they weren’t marooned. It doesn’t bear reflection. Yet life is said to be quite endurable on Roto Roa—that is, as endurable as it can be made for men thus marooned. Some day science may find a way to cure alcoholism without sending the patient to gaol, or isolating him on an island, like a leper. Twelve months is a large slice out of a man’s life, and his compulsory retirement from industrial life for that, period is a loss to the community.

A CALL FROM LONDON

On a recent Sunday evening the host at a popular Symonds Street boardinghouse was extolling the virtues of his “powerful” valve set to a lady friend. After some difficulty he tuned in on IYA. While listening to the discourse from a local church the couple were astonished to hear the speaker’s voice cut off suddenly, and to hear another voice: “Hullo, everybody! This is Station 2BD, London, speaking, experimenting on a new wave-length, with which we hope to reach Australia. We shall be obliged if any listeners in that country or elsewhere who are able to tune in will report at once.” The delighted host rushed out to his guests in the sitting-room, loudly proclaiming the fact that he had picked up London, and all assembled around the set to listen in. By that time, however, onl3 r a rumbling noise could be heard, with the hymns at the local church coming very faintly. Thereupon “mine host” phoned IYA and asked them to have the courtesy of keeping off the air “while London was speaking.” Two evenings later he heard his own voice called, presumably from 2BL, and upon investigation he discovered that the transmitting station he had been listening to was situated no further away than one of his own rooms, where one of his guests, with a bent for experimental wireless, had tapped his aerial.