From The Watch Tower

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 540, 18 December 1928, Page 8

From The Watch Tower

By

“THE LOOK-OUT MAN."

COV P LETS Tapped out while inviting one’s muse. Flogging my static mind, sadly 1 sit 'Waiting for beauty, waiting for wit, Sadly I sit. I can’t think of a thing; I am not happy, but neither 3 s a king. I might touch lightly on love or romance — And how would you like a sabot in the pantsf Or what if we think of Killonis’s mawlt How would it be if we don’t t After all I'd much rather brood on dyspepsia and debt, Headaches, and murders, and tumult; the sic eat Required of those who must xoork or stop eating — Working, in this case, means aimlessly bleating. Some buildings are tall, some policemen are fat. But surely there isn’t a sonnet in that. Carnations are pink—but stay, arc they yellow? — And I'M a remarkably whimsical fellow. We might write on nature, with stx'ess on the cow (Though the turkey is slightly more timely just now). Or the recent adventures of Hoover and Smith — And what would you rather be massacred xcith ? Motherhood's lovely, and so is the sea, Both matters of perfect indifference to Radios, talkie-films, airplanes, and such Inventions have never appealed to me much. But whisky is nice, and that makes me think I’ll stop right where I am and go out for a drink. W.G. CHRISTMAS SHOPPING According to “Mere Male”: “Christmas shopping—how manifold are its joys. You incautiously venture into a fancy goods shop without a hat on, and some one immediately pounces on you with: 'Oh, I want to see the small red purse in the second row of the bottom tier in the left-hand front window; what is the price of it?’ Before you can answer, she has you by the arm, and you have to use most ungallant methods to disengage yourself. It is all very difficult. Then you find a shop assistant for yourself, and commiserate. ‘Oh, it looks worse than it is,’ she says cheerfully; ‘people have not really started yet. They are only pawing things over.’ You decide to do a litlte pawing for yourself, but your examination of a nice trifle for Aunt Matilda is interrupted when someone snatches it away from you. Well, tha,t wasn’t pawing—it was clawing. Then you discover that you have either lost your money or had your pocket picked, so it is all the same, anyway.” THE STREETS OF AUCKLAND (A Potted Directory.) Queen Street. —Cars, crowds, sailor lads, tar-sprayers, pickaxes. Quay Street.—Beach .girls, hampers, soapboxes. Hobson Street.—Free parking, free fights, free beers (sometimes). Karangahape Road.—Christmas trees, crowds, children, parcels, perambulators. Symonds Street. —Shops, surgeries, sausages, stand by to repel boarders. Broadway, Newmarket. Trams, traffic jams, buses, busy-ness. Grey Avenue.—Seclusion, shade, Chinamen, Army lassies. Remuera Road. —Toy dogs, toy cars, “I held eight diamonds, but she called me out. . . .”

UNLIKELY INTERVIEWS Tli© Hon. O. F. Nelson: “Yes, I had a very good time at Geneva; we were all one happy family.” In these words the Hon. O. F. Nelson, who returned to Auckland yesterday, outlined his impressions of his trip abroad. For the League of Nations, Mr. Nelson returns with the greatest admiration. “They are such a jolly lot of fellows,” he said. "“For instance, on my first day in Geneva, who should I meet but Sir Austen Chamberlain, taking his Great Dane for a walk on the Boulevard Helvetique. ‘Why,’ he said, ‘you must be Mr. Nelson?’ I said yes, that was so, and he immediately said ‘What about a spot? Come along and meet the boys.’ So I went along, and I was introduced to M. Titulescu, who is such a quaint, droll sort of man, —a Rumanian, you know. Then I met Senor Aguero y Bethancourt, a most distinguished gentleman, of Cuba. He gave me a box of cigars. These preliminary courtesies made my way with the League quite easy. However, when it came to getting anything done, I discovered that they are most impractical. All they do is write notes, and the notes don’t seem to cut much ice. So here lam back in Auckland. As you know, a singularly felicitous set of circumstances has brought Sir George Richardson here at the same time. It must be fate, the way our paths are always crossing. I must go now. I have an appointment with him for morning tea.. What was that?—am) I going back to Samoa? Not unless Sir George goes back, too. Samoa will never be the same to me while he is not there.”