MUNDANE MUSINGS

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 85, 1 July 1927, Page 5

MUNDANE MUSINGS

MOONLIGHT AND MILEAGE Pamela didn’t realise how very impolite she was being—but then, luckily, Mrs. Devereux-Smyth e didn’t know it either. She chattered beamingly on with her descriptions of her recent travels, oblivious of that nerves-on-edge, exasperated expression on Pamela’s face. “Fiesole? Oh, yes, I remember now; we found the most wonderful hotel there, and bargained with the landlord till he took us in for thirty-five lire! Think of it; at the rate the exchange was then it came to less than ” ‘Were you long in Italy?” I interposed, hurriedly, watching Pamela’s face. “Not so long as we had meant to stay. But the French exchange was so much better than the Italian just then—better for us, I mean—that it seemed a shame not to take advantage of it. Of course, there was the visitor’s tax, but ” Was Pamela going to clap her hands over her ears? No; thank goodness, she slipped from the room, leaving me to the remainder of the reminiscences. “I should have shrieked if I’d heard one more price mentioned,” she protested later. “Really, the woman’s impossible! She just talks in prices and hotel bills!” “Was that a crash of glass I heard?” the murmur came from the direction of Jim’s easy chair. “Pray be careful with your stones, Pamela!” Pamela stared indignantly. “Well, you can’t say that I live in a glass house where counting the cost, is concerned,” she said. “Did we ever count costs on our Italian trip, for instance? Don’t you remember how we stayed on at Camogli because the colour on those houses down near the port was so unbelievably beautiful, and quite forgot to reckon first whether we could afford it? And how we got stranded in that quaint little town on the way to Florence, because we just had to buy that gorgeous old jar? Then —oh, do you remember the moonlight at San Fruttuoso, and ” “Exactly,” said Jim. solemnly. “She just talks in bits of colour and old

doors, doesn’t she?” He turned to me with a twinkle. “Jim! You know you loved them just as much as I did, and you know you never thought of dull things like prices!” “You’re muddling the issue, old thing! You said just now that you never counted the cost. And then you begin to count them as carefully as ever Mrs. Devereux-Smythe did. The difference is that you don’t use the same coinage in your reckoning! Mrs. Devereux-Smy the computes her holidays in Treasury notes; you use little mind-pictures—glimpses of colour lovely shapes!” “Well, aren’t those the things thar are worth while?” demanded Pamela “To us, yes; they are our currency, so to speak. But we count them up as jealously as Mrs. Devereux-Smythe does her hotel bills. And if we tried to describe our trip to her in our coinage, she’d be just as bored as you were with her recital.” “Well, it’s very dull,” pouted Pamela. “The other fellow’s currency generally is, whether it’s money, or moonlight, or mileage. That’s not my point. I’m arguing against our blaming the other chap for perpetually counting his costs when we’re doing exactly the same thing ourselves—in our own coinage. See, old thing?” “H-mm!” said Pamela, non-corp-mit-tally. A few stoned dates added to an apple tart or pie improve the flavour very much. Two tablespoons to a tart the size of a sandwich-tin is a good proportion.