FROM THE WATCH TOWER

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 202, 15 November 1927, Page 8

FROM THE WATCH TOWER

By “THE LOOK-OUT MAN” -LEST WE FORGET ” During an inspection of returned soldiers on parade at New Plymouth, Major-General Young, G.0.C., New Zealand Forces, noticed a man wearing the Military Medal, and asked him where he won it. “At carrying you out, sir,” replied the man. How soon we forget! However, it may be depended that when the G.O.C. recognised his preserver, he did not forget the way to show his appreciation. One may forget a face, but not a deed. NATURE NOTES “If you want to do something big -—wash the elephant.” That is the title of the newest jazz production from the land of hominy and clam chowder. A bigger task, according to a Government stock inspector, would be to dip a he-man lion, fresh from the veldt, to remove any "company” that he might be entertaining. “Little fleas have lesser fleas,” we all know, and the converse applies. Apparently the largest variety finds very good hunting among the lion family. But if you dip a lion, he invariably licks the mixture and the results are sometimes fatal. It is wiser, therefore, to allow him to entertain on a large scale. Two lions were passed by the censor the other day before being admitted to the Auckland Zoo. They were far from pleased at his familiarity and clearly gave him to understand that “what they had, they held.” Being a tactful man, he took the only course available, and, seeing that the visitors were in a healthy condition, refrained from taking their temperature or making them swear the oath of allegiance. The life of a stock inspector who, when circuses come to town, is expected to diagnose mumps in a camel and adenoids in a puma, is not the bed of roses that some of us have imagine* it to be. THE ISLE OF PEACE Published simultaneously with a cable message which states that the ex-Kaiser has bought an island on Lake Maggiore, Switzerland, which he has renamed "The Island of World Peace,” is another, stating that Prince Lichnowsky, in his “Memoirs,” quotes correspondence which definitely fixes the blame of the war on Wilhelm. Since Prince Lichnowsky was German Ambassador to Britain on the outbreak of the war, he ought to know what he is talking about. When Wilhelm retires to his “Island of World Peace,” he can take Lichnowsky’s with him, and see what measures of soul-peace he can get out of the knowledge that he brought about a world war in which men were slain by the million. By the way, peculiar as it may appear now, Wilhelm could be quite legally tried (and hanged) if he visited England; for at the inquest on the victims of a German shelling raid from the sea on an English coastal town, the coroner’s jury returned a verdict of wilful murder against the Kaiser. And, when all is said and done, the worst murderers who ever had an English rope placed around their necks were harmless characters compared with Wilhelm.

% 34 % »If Sf * IK 34 % BLAMING THE DEAD It seems somehow to spoil the chivalrous record of Sir lan Hamilton to find him blaming the dead for the Dardanelles failure. Sir lan, in his latest public address, described the late Field Marshal Sir Henry Wilson as the arch-enemy of the expedition, and said Sir Henry had made It his business to try to ruin it. Lord French and Lord Fisher were also blamed by Sir lan, for their opposition to the adventure. Nasty though this recrimination appears to be, it may further influence public opinion against war, for it shows that jealousies and animosities among high commands may add to the slaughter and the waste of armed conflict, which only last week were so scathingly denounced by Field-Marshall Sir William Robertson. Indeed, it may he accepted as very strong backing for Sir William’s argument. NOT EVIDENCE The cheerful manner in which police prosecutors arise in a court and inform magistrates that an accused person is fond of beer and dislikes work, or is a well-known this or that, or “has a bad name,” etc., is amazing. Even more amazing is the effect it has in assisting magistrates to decide upon the penalty to be imposed. This sort of thing is quite the regular order in the police courts, as it is in the Supreme Court, where it is casually mentioned that the report of the probation officer is favourable or unfavourable, as the case may be. But it is not evidence. Statements that prejudice an accused person ought only be accepted as sworn evidence. They might not then be so lightly made.