From The Watch Tower

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 458, 13 September 1928, Page 8

From The Watch Tower

By

“THE LOOK-OUT MAN.”

TRAINING ALL BLACKS Several football teams are contesting the championship of Mount Eden Gaol. Enthusiasm is not wanting and the standard of football is said to be surprisingly high. It is even possible that, in the future, budding All Blacks will be unable to gain international caps without serving a term in Mount Eden to complete their training. A NATURAL MISTAKE After tuning in to Christchurch last evening to try to hear the latest about the airmen, and listening for n while the L.O.M. switched off his set, disgusted with what he thought was static. He now learns he was unfortunate to listen to the banquet during the soup course. SO WE PROGRESS A request has been made to the Auckland Harbour Board that one carrying firm handle all luggage from steamers. No doubt this would be a great improvement —almost as great an improvement as the present system was on the old, when the luggage merely sailed away again with the ship while the ex-passenger sent distracted telegrams to ascertain the whereabouts of his belongings. STRANGE! Members of the New Zealand Boxing Association appeared before the committee of the House on Tuesday to protest against the petition of Christchurch enthusiasts to break away and form a new association to control the sport in the Dominion. Why protest? We had always thought that the main fault with the modern boxing was that there was not sufficient break-away. QUITE LEGAL, A motorist who called at Te Awa-‘ mutu to replenish the petrol tank of his car was recently brought before the Court on a charge of being on licensed premises after hours, but the case was dismissed. All he ordered was a pint of benzine with a dash of water for his radiator. Of course he may have wanted “oiling up.” A SOAPY DIET Tony, a monkey in a New York zoo, has won a name for himself by his penchant for soap as an article of diet. Or, to be more precise, Tony had distinction as a soap-eater until quite recently. Firstly, the .keepers used to feed him with choice pieces of Brown Windsor; in moderation, mind you. There was no indulgence. The craze spread. 'Unprincipled old women could be seen creeping to the bars of Tony’s cage, and surreptitiously feeding him with soapy titbits. His capacity was his undoing. He died the other day, having swallowed a bar of the best almond-scented. BEAVER! Some of the sailors who have returned from the Islands on the Dunedin have, it is said, allowed their beards to grow. Books of “Beaver” rules are enjoying a brisk sale, and the youth of Auckland is eagerly looking forward to a revival of the grand old game, which circumstances have kept out of vogue for some time.

AMANULLAH'B FLOWER . A German who was in Teheran last month when the King and Queen of Afghanistan arrived gives an amusing account of the fuss there was about the Queen’s veil. The closelyveiled Persian ladies crowded the streets to discover whether the Queen would actually show her face as she had done in Europe. They only caught a glimpse of her as her car raced along, but were able to see that although she was dressed in the height of the Paris fashion she had covered the lower part of her face with a thin silk handkerchief. The Grand Chamberlain was in a quandary. Did the Paris frock indicate that the Queen desired to be treated as a European -woman or the handkerchief indicate that she resumed the habits of an Oriental woman? The Paris frock won, and the Oueen was invited to all the festivities at which European women would be present. She refused to go. “If her Majesty the Spouse of the Shah is not to be present,” she said, “I prefer to remain with her.” And as the Shah was not prepared to let his wife leave her Persian seclusion the Queen of Afghanistan did not appear in public. The King was dissatisfied. “If one has a beautiful flower,” he said to some Persian officials, “one likes to show it in one’s button-hole.. And the Queen is very beautiful.”