From The Watch Tower

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 339, 26 April 1928, Page 8

From The Watch Tower

By "THE LOOK-CUT MAN.” POINTS OF VIEW “Seeing the World by Motor-Car”— heading in yesterday’s news. This, we suppose, demonstrates the motorists’ pdint of view. The pedestrian, of course, is usually shown the next. RAPS AND REPUTATION Tom Heeney, sailing tor fistic fame in America, says he does not care a rap for Tunney’s reputation. He feels like a school boy going on holiday. There is always a likelihood in these fistic affairs that a rap of Tunney’s reputation may give our champion a fairly long spell. WAR. LITERATURE The poetry of the war was the subject of a recent address by Mr. J. A. Lee, and no doubt he hoped that the introduction of the work of these seared soldiers would induce pacific thoughts to come to the minds of some of his listeners. Sassoon’s terrible realism strips war of its glamour, and more glamour still would be lost if people were forced to read Barbusse’s “Under Fire,” and Andreas Lazio’s “Men In War.” Little worthy literature was inspired by the war, but that little is. terrifying. SNEAK THIEVES With so many sneak thieves about, the public cannot be too careful. Only yesterday it was reported that a trotting horse had been stolen from its stable at New Plymouth and carted away in a motor-lorry. We wait now to learn that the lorry was stolen, too. It Is to be hoped that thp officials at the zoo are keeping a sharp eye on their charges. These light-fingered chaps would think nothing of lifting the elephant. A "BILLY” BOOK Mr. W. M. Hughes, formerly Prime Minister of Australia, has fallen victim to the malady so common to elderly statesmen, and is writing a book. “O that mine enemy would write a book!” It will give the political adversaries of Mr. Hughes some ammunition. The subject of Mr. Hughes’s literary effort will be the government of Empire. A very interesting chapter would be, “How I Governed Australia —by War-Time Regulation.” A large section of Australians will never forgive Mr. Hughes those regulations. * * * RANGIPAI, THE BALLAD SINGER The crooning of “Hine a Hine” (Daughter oh Daughter!), a plaintive lullaby, at a gathering at the Penwomen’s Club in Auckland the other night recalled Rangipai, the composer. Rangipai, who called herself “Princess” for professional purposes, achieved some fame both in New Zealand and abroad, as a ballad-singer. She was the daughter of Colonel Porter, well known in Maori circles, and her mother was a native woman of considerable rank. Rangipai was successful as a songstress in England and also appeared on the concert platform in the United States. But she eventually returned to her native New Zealand. The call of her blood was irresistible. Rangipai, though a charming and cultured woman whose voice had given pleasure to thousands, went back to the mat. Years later, as she squatted .before the fire in her whare in a small East Coast village, where she eventually died and was buried, Rangipai, in a full Maori skirt and a rug across her shoulders, could not be recognised apart from the other women of the pa. Gone was the handsome ballad singer, the forerunner of' many Maori entertainers who have since gone abroad. But Rangipai’s exit was graceful. There was no series of “farewell” farewells for her. Once she left the platform the Maori songstress never returned to it.

QUICK THIEE-CATOHING It is by no means so easy to get. away with a stolen car in Sydney as it is in Auckland. In Sydney the police patrol the city and suburbs in fast motor-cars equipped with wireless, with one man continuously listening-in. A message from some near or far police station, and off rushes the patrol to the scene of a crime, or to intercept some runaway. Only this week a patrol followed and overtook a man who had stolen a motor, firing six shots at the fugitive when tearing along at 60 miles an hour (What a thriller had there been a cinematograph man in the motor with his machine!) What would have happened to the stolen car had one of the shots taken effect, when it was travelling at this speed can be imagined. The bullets missed, however, but the thief got one in the face after he had abandoned the car and was climbing a fence.