FROM THE WATCH TOWER

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 652, 2 May 1929, Page 8

FROM THE WATCH TOWER

By «

“THE LOOK-OUT MAN.”

A DISARMING STATEMENT “Men will not long recognise tlie sword as the major source of authority,” writes ex-President Calvin Coolidge, discussing in the “Ladies’ Home Journal” the promotion of peace through a limitation of armaments. —(Cable.) Take down your sword and sabre, Your rapier from the wall, Your dagger, your stiletto . . . We're going to scrap them all. Soon will the mighty nations All bill and coo like birds; In future icarfare will be waged With looks and tender -words. SQUIDGE. TH ETENDER THOUGHT A pretty thought was daintily expressed by the IYA people last evening, when Mr. George Baildon was switched into the programme to, give thanks to his supporters. After “saying his piece” Mr. Baildon withdrew, and the programme proceeded. The next number was Chopin’s Funeral March. THE GREAT DECISION A cable message states that Mr. Baldwin has already decided who shall hold the key positions in his postelection Cabinet. It will be left to the electors who shall not hold them. HIS EXCELLENCY MIS-KICKED The motorist who rail Into the Gov-ernor-General’s car had sufficient cause to be flurried. Worse was the embarrassment of a Wellington footballer. An earlier Governor-General’s Saturday stroll used to take him past the Kilbirnie football ground. There he stopped one day, just as a ball kicked out of bounds rolled toward his feet. Sportively he kicked at the ball, to return It to the player hurrying toward him. But he misklcked, aud the ball bounced into a pool, splashing the footballer. The muddied oaf expressed himself forcefully and to the point. He was the unhappiest youth in Wellington when he learned the brutal truth. THE CAPTAIN’S DAUGHTER “By Tre, Pol, and Pen, you can tell the Cornish men.” And by the “Tre,” at least, you can usually identify the sombre-looking freighters of the Hain line, which is proud of its Cornish origin, even though it does employ Arab stokers who yesterday did the traditional thing and “silently stole away.” Under their counters, where ships tell the world their port of registry, the Hain ships carry the message of St. Ives, and if they do not happen to be the Trevessa or Tregenna or something equally Cornish, and are named, as some of them are, from rivers, then the name St. Ives still binds them to Cornwall. There is one of them called the Min, named after a large if obscure river in China. A scribe who boarded the ship at Napier was assured in all solemnity by a junior officer that she was named after the captain’s daughter. An angry sea dog called at the newspaper office the next day. The captain was a bachelor. PRICKING THE CARD Methods adopted by perplexed voters in selecting 21 good men and true (or women, also true) for the City Council verged from the sublime to the ridiculous. Logic seemed to be rarely employed. One sturdy citizen known to this column cherishes an infinite hatred of Justices of the Peace. He may have been once fined for riding a bicycle without a light. At any rate, his vengeful pencil raced down the list, striking out all who had the letters J.P. after their names. Another man, no Scotsman, either, made it his first task to see that all the “Macs” were given his vote. He ticked them off first of all, apparently reasoning with a curious inverse logic that the city’s money would be safest iu their care. Still another voter went down the list and knocked out the P.P.A. endorsements, one, by one while lastly a burgess of odd mind and strange sportsmanship cancelled for a start all whom he knew to have leanings toward Rugby League. RATTLING THE BONES A campaign for the use of British eggs lias lately been inaugurated in England and Scotland, and the slogans: “Laid in England” or “Laid in Scotland,” have been freely used. In the House of Commons a humorous Scot asked the Secretary of State to order that all third-class eggs should be stamped with the Scotish motto: “Nemo me impune lacessit,” which in broad Doric might be translated to mean: “Wha daur meddle wi’ me?” While this was happening at Westminster, the origin of certain imported goods was troubling Customs officers at New York. Six human skeletons which had reached Manhattan from Germany i were held up, and a judge of the I U.S. Court assessed upon the importers a 10 per cent, fine for their ; failure to mark the skeletons “Made in i Germany.”